The use of ICT in schools is now well established in most European nation states. Research over almost two decades provides a comprehensive picture of factors associated with effective uses of ICT to enhance teaching and learning processes. Emergent technologies, such as those which described as 'Web 2.0', have prompted a 'second wave' of research seeking to identify the potential contribution of these technologies to pedagogical processes, as well as how they might be deployed in conjunction with more ‘traditional’ forms of ICT. Thus research into the educational uses of ICT over 20 years or more has produced a rich body of evidence upon which educators may draw.

It is something of a curiosity, therefore, that while we have amassed a huge amount of information about the level and nature of ICT in schools and its impact on teaching and learning, relatively little is known about these same issues in relation to the use of ICT for the professional development of teachers. This is not to suggest that research is non-existent, merely that in contrast to the abundant body of knowledge on the educational potential of ICT where pupils are the end beneficiaries, research into its use to educate teachers is relatively limited.

This leaves open a question about whether good practice has - for one reason or another - not been subject to the same kind of rigorous research that has attended the use of ICT in the classroom, or whether there is simply a limited amount of such practice to study. If the latter were true, this may suggest that models of in-service (school based) professional development are more resistant to change than classroom practice, with more traditional approaches to teacher training as the dominant form.

What existing research does clearly indicate is that ICT has the potential to make a significant difference to the reach and quality of teacher professional development, for both pre- and in-service practitioners. For example carefully designed online professional development programmes at least match the outcomes of more traditional models. Much of the most effective and purposeful ICT-mediated CPD is where technology facilitates reflection on and in classroom practice both for self-evaluation and for the observation of more experienced others. The learning potential of working collaboratively has long been recognised, and here ICT has a powerful role to play in facilitating peer-interaction and the building of professional learning communities.

In exploring these issues, the symposium seeks to achieve two broad aims; to open up the issues described in the opening paragraphs of this proposal for discussion and further debate amongst experienced researchers in the field, and to present internationally diverse research which has investigated the potential of ICT to promote the professional development process for teachers, and the contexts in which such processes are most effective. The context for this two-part symposium is a Comenius-funded project, Integral Teacher Training (IntTT) (www.helsinki.fi/integralteacher/index.html) which seeks to promote the digital and communicative competences of teachers. The project involves six partner nations, of which five offer papers in this symposium.