In recent decades the world has changed dramatically. Globalization and migration, rapid technological advancement and widespread ease of Access to information are changes that require a deliberate adjustment in the ways we deliver education. In order to prepare students for today’s realities, education systems are now compelled to focus more on developing students’ skills and competencies that would develop them holistically. Moving beyond foundational skills like literacy and numeracy skills, students need competencies such as creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, self-awareness, conflict resolution, and ethical use of ICT. Students need these new sets of generic skills to equip them for the challenges and changes ahead. In 2013, UNESCO Bangkok adopted the term ‘transversal competencies’ to describe these skills and competencies needed for the twenty-first century. The changes brought about by globalised world and diverse societies, have heightened the need to foster these transversal competencies and the new role of teachers is seen as vital to developing them.

Ensuring that students engage in meaningful activities and experiences that lead to developing these competencies necessitates a change in the mindsets and roles of teachers. From being transmitters of factual knowledge, teachers now need to be facilitators of active learning, using strategies and approaches that are very different from those employed in conventional classrooms.

If teachers are to facilitate students’ acquisition of transversal competencies, however, they must be provided with support, and the required education reforms must be implemented. Specifically, teachers need to embark on professional developmentactivities that prepare them to cultivate students’ transversal/generic competencies in the classroom and beyond.

This report, prepared by the Asia Pacific Education Research Institutes Network (ERI‑Net), under the auspices of UNESCO Bangkok, is the third and final in a series of in-depth studies on transversal competencies.

This final study examined how teachers in the Asia‑Pacific region are being prepared and supported to meet the challenges of facilitating the learning of transversal competencies.

The study compiled the findings of ten case studies from nine countries in the Asia‑Pacific region, and has identified an urgent need for school- and system-level support to create a ‘space’ in which transversal competencies can be deliberately taught, learned and assessed, with teachers as the key.

The report offers valuable insights applicable to the Asia‑Pacific region and beyond. It is hoped that policy-makers, educators and experts will find this a useful resource in advancing the Professional.