On September 1, 1992 the Senate of the University of Trnava established the Faculty of Education, as a constituent part of the renewed Trnava University. The Faculty of Education is proud to continue the Christian and humanistic traditions of its renowned predecessor – the University of Trnava of 1635–1777.
Activities of the Faculty mainly focus on education and the training of elementary‑school teachers. Nowadays, the Faculty provides a well‑rounded education and training for future elementary – and secondary‑school teachers in accredited programs of study. During their studies, the students can acquire professional, teaching and psychological knowledge as well as practical teaching skills. The Faculty has at its disposal advanced technical equipment, laboratories, studios, and classrooms with audio‑visual aids, and its academic departments are run by competent staff. The high‑quality standard of the education provided by the Faculty is demonstrated in the way graduates apply their knowledge and skills in practice.
Another important task is to develop activities in research and the arts. As an institution providing education and training to future teachers, the Faculty of Education is also focused on research and its teachers and research scientists and/or scholars are engaged in various specific areas of research and science. The focus of the Faculty’s research is on specific problems in relation to individual subjects, their theory and teaching practice, and it is conducted in terms of educational and psychological aspects. These research activities; performed by the staff of the Faculty, result in numerous publications as well as in the active participation of the researchers in scientific conferences both in Slovakia and abroad. As for the research activities, it is also necessary to mention members of the Department of Art Education, who are involved in arts‑related scholarly research.
The Faculty has developed its own basic strategic documents, with the aim of drawing up the prospects and objectives of its future development. These documents are to be amended and updated in the future, when‑ever necessary, so as to comply with the concept of higher‑education development in the Slovak Republic, the effective wording of the Higher Education Act, and with the development strategy of the Trnava University. At present, study at the Faculty of Education, Trnava University, is fully organized and carried out in accordance with the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS).
The department of School Education is a leading department of ECEC development in Slovakia. It takes the leadership not only in its impact on Slovak Early Years Education but it is very active in research and projects on an international level. The department cooperates in research with the most important research institution in Slovakia – the Slovak Academy of Sciences. It is also very active in development and implementation of the national early years curriculum. Apart from research and development activities, the department is also involved in developing activities in various developing countries. Because of this, the department members helped to establish Kenya Center for Early Childhood and Preschool Education Studies in 2015 at the Faculty of Education. At the department there is also based a Slovak branch of international organization ACEI (Association for Childhood Education International) with its seat in Washington (https://acei.org/ ). The department runs edited internationally accredited Journal of Pedagogy (http://www.degruyter.com/view/j/jped ), which is included in the SCOPUS database and other important international publishing databases.
Research profile of the department covers following fields:
- education policy
- curriculum development
- early literacy
- inequalities in education
- comparative education
- international child(hood) studies