Mission

The graduate school views as its main mission the training of the researcher recruits in pedagogy considered as a modern, empirical social science. The analysis of institutionalized learning, teaching and education are in the center of its training programs, according to the research traditions of the University of Szeged. Its mission is also training for the wide spectrum of scientific activities regarding teaching and learning, the presentation of the entire variety of applicable research methods, and research into the social, economic and historical connections of education. These priorities successfully complete the pedagogy researcher training that can be acquired elsewhere in the country and reflect the national need for professionally trained researchers.

Because of the national leading role played by the members of the graduate school in certain branches of pedagogy and in the field of research in pedagogical surveying, the school is attended by students from all over the country. Its training programs are also open for foreign students, and the faculty is prepared to teach in English. The graduate school is part of the European system of scientific training, cooperation in the field of research and education and exchange programs. The teachers and researchers of Hungarian higher education institutions abroad are heartly welcome for a degree program at the graduate school.

Future

Pedagogy is one of the social sciences with the most dynamic evolution. The main reason is that knowledge became a decisive factor of economic competitiveness and social development in the last few decades. As a consequence of this process, transmitting social knowledge has received an increasing amount of attention. The new information and communication technologies widened the possibilities and ways of access to knowledge. This altogether altered the tasks of school education and there is an increasing need for specialists to organize and manage the learning processes outside school. In the most developed regions of the world, the research resources of teaching and learning have increased very rapidly, the scientific infrastructure has developed and the volume of research has also increased. As a consequence of this dynamic development, there will be a constant need of specialists in the research of teaching and learning in Europe, as well. According to the trends of the socioeconomic processes in Hungary there will also be a greater need for professional researchers trained by the Graduate School.