EU Parents

The European Parents’ Association (EUParents)

Website: https://europarents.eu/
Country: Belgium

Organisation profile

The European Parents’ Association has been the only EU-level organization representing parents as a stakeholder group in education since its foundation in 1985. Through 40+ member organizations EPA have a nearly full coverage of Europe with a working contact in almost all EU-member states, including members from some non-EU countries represented in the ImmuHubs project (e.g. Serbia, Ukraine). The main objectives of EPA are to reach out to 150 million European parents: to promote and advocate for the active involvement of parents as primary educators in all stages of the education of their children, to support parents’ associations and individual parents for stakeholder involvement in different European countries by offering opportunities for training, cooperation and information exchange, to support the highest possible quality of education for all children in Europe especially by active involvement in EU-level policy development and assessment to disseminate relevant information among its members.

In order to do so, EAP have a working Board of Directors (7 members coming from different countries which cover the geographical width and breadth of Europe). Furthermore, as the only representative association of parents at the EU level, EPA has worked closely with other stakeholder groups, different EU institutions and political groups. As stakeholder involvement is now a well-established part of official EU policies, EAP continues to work in line with post EU 2020 and post ET 2020 policies in working groups, alliances and other available forms to formulate the contents of the parental involvement as well as supporting our members in their national and regional work and their school systems. In order to boost participation and commitment, EPA is continuing its cooperation with EU institutions and relevant policy makers for the necessary frameworks to be set up in countries where parental involvement is not yet part of education governance.

Operational Capacity

The EPA capacity lies in the network of member and partner organizations in different countries that can be involved in surveys and/or focus groups to test strategies that are developed within the ImmuHubs project, and to serve as control groups, or to help collect feedback and raise awareness about the ImmuHubs project. EAP’s biannual conferences serve as hubs for knowledge dissemination, including for project outputs and developments. EPA regional meetings foster exchange among different groups about their perspectives, attitudes and learning.