The Institute for Education (IfE) in Pembroke, Malta, hosted the international conference ‘Inspire, Foster, Educate: Global Research in Education Today’ from 27-29 November 2025. The conference convened researchers, teacher-educators, school leaders, policymakers, and practitioners to reflect on education’s future and its present responsibilities and challenges. The three-day programme invited diverse perspectives and approaches by presenting conceptual and empirical research and by encouraging thoughtful dialogue and innovative disciplinary thinking.
STRIDE closely aligns with the event’s focus on education’s present responsibilities and future possibilities, and contributed to the event’s reflection on the purposes of education and on how research can better serve judgment, equity, and human flourishing in a period of rapid change.
Colleagues from STRIDE participated in the conference’s Parallel Session 3, titled ‘Teachers’ Professional Growth and Comparative Perspectives’. This session focused on comparative studies of teacher competence, student learning, and the links between research and classroom practice. Lihong Huang and Siri Mohammad-Roe from OsloMet, in collaboration with Mario Mallia and Latrell Gray Almosa Arcenas from the Institute for Education (IfE), presented their research results under the title ‘Teachers’ professional competence and student learning achievement in Malta, Norway and the Philippines’. This work was part of an external collaboration within the STRIDE project, aimed at contributing to a better understanding of the similarities and differences among three education systems, focusing on teachers’ professional qualifications, teacher agency, and their relationship to mathematics learning achievement. The study analyses two types of data: 1) national regulative/policy documents on the teacher professional qualification, including pre-service and in-service professional development, and 2) quantitative data from the three countries’ participation in the large-scale international education assessment study, ‘Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS 2019).
A full manuscript of this study will be submitted to the Malta Journal of Education, the annual journal published by the Institute for Education. The journal features recent research in education and teacher training, bringing together researchers, educators, school leaders, and policymakers to share insights aimed at enhancing the education sector. Each edition focuses on a specific theme, often showcasing research first presented at the Institute’s annual symposium.
