We hope that you will find the answers to common questions about Connecting Classrooms below. If the information you need is not given below, please contact us
Connecting Classrooms has a whole school approach that benefits everyone in the school community and helps schools, local authorities and federations to fulfil their objectives. You can find detailed information on the benefits of Connecting Classrooms for all those who participate here.
Connecting Classrooms creates partnerships between clusters of schools and local authorities/federations in the UK and clusters of schools and education districts in various regions of the world. The participating countries in each region are as follows:
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Central South Asia - Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Kazakhstan and Pakistan |
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China |
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East Asia - Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam |
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Europe - Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain and Ukraine |
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India and Sri Lanka |
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Latin America and the Caribbean - Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Jamaica, Mexico, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela |
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Middle East - Bahrain, Iraq Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Yemen |
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Near East and North Africa - Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia |
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Sub-Saharan Africa - Ghana, Kenya, Mauritius, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierra Leon South Africa, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe |
Please note that this list of countries is subject to change.
In Connecting Classrooms, a cluster is a group of schools, usually from the same geographical area, that plan project work together, participate in joint partnership activities and generally support each other during the term of the partnership.
The size of a cluster can vary from three to ten schools, depending on the countries involved in a partnership. Information regarding a specific country or region will be available here when that country or region is recruiting for partners in the UK.
One of the principles behind Connecting Classrooms is a desire to ensure that partnerships are sustainable. From experience, schools that work together in a cluster are able to support each other through an international partnership and are therefore more likely to continue their partnership after involvement in Connecting Classrooms finishes. Working with other schools in your area also supports social cohesion.
Connecting Classrooms is only looking to recruit clusters of schools on to the programme. You can find advice on how to form a cluster here.
If you don’t want to work in a cluster, you can find a partner school in another country through British Council Schools Online instead of applying to Connecting Classrooms.
You can also join the Connecting Classrooms Online Community, where you can network with teachers in other countries and join online discussion forums and projects.
In general, we are looking for a range of schools to make up a cluster. In the UK, primary schools, infant and junior schools, special schools, secondary schools and sixth form colleges in the UK may be able to join Connecting Classrooms, depending on the specific recruitment criteria of the partner country or region concerned. Information regarding the types of UK schools that are eligible to link with partners in a specific country or region are available here when that country or region is recruiting for partners in the UK.
Institutions of higher education are not eligible to participate in Connecting Classrooms.
Yes. We are keen to encourage schools from across the UK to participate in Connecting Classrooms.
Each cluster of schools in each country is co-ordinated by a designated partnership co-ordinator. In the UK we ask that this person is based in the supporting local authority or federation.* Alternatively, if the local authority or federation is unable to co-ordinate the cluster, the partnership co-ordinator can be a representative of a family of schools, the local Youth Sport Trust, the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust or another suitable organisation. For more information about local authority contacts and other organisations that can co-ordinate Connecting Classrooms partnerships, please visit British Council Schools Online.
*Update, July 2011: Please note that for the current application round in the UK we are piloting a new approach to the management and development of Connecting Classrooms partnerships, in which we are no longer asking for a local authority, federation or other organisation to support or co-ordinate clusters of schools. For this application round, a member of staff from one school in the cluster can act as the partnership co-ordinator, or an appropriate representative of a local authority, federation or other organisation if they are willing to fulfil this role. Please see the Application Guidelines in 'How to get involved' for more information.
For information about partnership co-ordinators for schools outside the UK, please contact us.
For each cluster, the partnership co-ordinator will be required to:
- co-ordinate the involvement of their side of the partnership (in the UK this includes bringing together a group of schools that are ready and willing to participate in the programme and completing the application).
- manage any grant funding from the British Council for the co-ordinating body and participating schools.
- arrange briefings and meetings with schools in their cluster.
- liaise with partnership co-ordinators in other countries in the partnership.
- be the main point of contact for the British Council.
- be responsible for evaluating the partnership and submitting financial and narrative reports.
It should also be noted that some of the tasks and duties detailed above may be delegated to a specified member of staff at one of the cluster schools.
No. You will be linked with schools in your chosen country or region through the Connecting Classrooms programme.
Connecting Classrooms creates bilateral or trilateral partnerships, depending on the regions of the world concerned.
In a bilateral partnership you will be linked with one cluster of schools from one country in the relevant region. For example, in Connecting Classrooms in the Middle East a group of schools in the UK may be linked with one group of schools in Oman.
In a trilateral partnership you will be linked with one cluster of schools in each of two countries in the region. For example, for Connecting Classrooms in Sub Saharan Africa you may be linked with a group of schools in Zambia and a group of schools in Ghana - in a three-way partnership.
Information on whether the region you are interested in working with creates trilateral or bilateral partnerships will be available here when that particular region is recruiting for partners in the UK.
No, this is not possible with Connecting Classrooms. You can find other sources of funding for your partnership here.
Connecting Classrooms schools engage in joint curriculum projects. There are two key elements to such projects. The first is that they are collaborative, involving an exchange of ideas, information and class work between learners and teachers in partner schools. Secondly, the project should complement the school curriculum to the extent that the project is linked to key subject areas or themes rather than being limited to after-school clubs or activities.
The schools in the partnership decide together on the content and detail of their joint curriculum projects, with the support of British Council staff. All those involved in the partnership are encouraged to contribute to the planning process.
Yes. For all partnerships, regardless of the partner country or region, the British Council provides an annual grant of £1,000 to the partnership co-ordinator.* In many cases an additional annual grant is available to the participating schools to support the purchasing of project related materials and in some cases to support face to face meetings and international travel to partner schools.
**Update, July 2011: Please note that for the current application round in the UK we are piloting a new approach to the management and development of Connecting Classrooms partnerships, in which we are no longer asking for a local authority, federation or other organisation to support or co-ordinate clusters of schools. This means that we are not able to offer the grant for co-ordination that used to be available.
Information regarding the grants available for partnerships with a specific country or region is available here when that particular country or region is recruiting for partners in the UK. If you are not in the UK and wish to find out more about the grants available to participants in your country, please contact us.
If your application to join Connecting Classrooms is successful, local authority/federation officials, partnership co-ordinators and teachers may be required to attend a contact seminar where the partners meet face to face and the partnerships are formed. These contact seminars may be held outside the UK. Further information regarding contact seminars will be made available to you, should your application be successful.
For some partnerships a portion of the annual grant to schools can be used to fund face to face meetings with partners and school visits either in the UK or in the partner country. Where such a travel grant does exist, the cluster will decide who travels and those travelling may include officials from the local authority or federation, partnership co-ordinator or teachers.
Learners can accompany teachers on international visits if there is a travel grant available to the schools. As funding is limited, schools often investigate the availability of other sources of funding when planning to take groups of learners abroad.
Information regarding the availability of a travel grant for links with a particular country or region will be available here when that country or region is recruiting for partners in the UK.
For all international visits funded or partially funded by the British Council, the travel itinerary and programme of activities must be pre-approved by the British Council.
The British Council provides annual grants for up to three years. We also provide support, advice and guidance to enable schools to develop sustainable partnerships which remain active beyond the three years of funding.
Yes. We are committed to supporting the professional development of teachers, head teachers, partnership co-ordinators and other participants in the programme. We do this through our International Co-ordinators' Course, contact seminars and other training opportunities.
Yes. However, ideally, we are looking for partnerships that involve UK schools with different levels of experience in working internationally and those that are new to Connecting Classrooms. Priority will be given to applications that offer this. This is because we want to increase the number of UK schools involved in international partnerships and Connecting Classrooms and we also want to ensure that inexperienced schools can learn from more experienced ones. We are happy for UK local authorities/federations to apply for partnerships with multiple regions of the world, as long as there are different schools involved in each partnership.
In most cases, such as for those schools receiving funding through Comenius, participating in Connecting Classrooms will not prevent your school from receiving funding through other programmes managed by the British Council. However, we would advise you to check with us first about any particular programme which concerns you.
We invite applications from clusters of UK schools and local authorities/federations two times per year and will publish detailed application information and forms here. Please note that not every region of the world will be recruiting UK partners at the same time.
If you are not in the UK and are interested in participating in the programme, please contact us to find out how recruitment works in your country.
UK schools need to be registered for the International School Award before they apply to participate in Connecting Classrooms. You can register your school online here. In most cases, project activities carried out during the course of your Connecting Classrooms partnership will enable your school to achieve full ISA accreditation.
If your school is not in the UK, please contact us to find out about the requirements in your country.
Schools are usually expected to commit to their international partnership for at least three years. Given that withdrawing from the programme has a negative impact on all those involved we would advise against applying for Connecting Classrooms if you are unable to make such a commitment.
Where a school wishes to withdraw from the programme, the school will be expected to continue to participate in the partnership until the end of the academic year, or the end of the standard reporting period. The school will also be expected to provide a detailed justification for their decision and will be required to return any unspent grant funding that it has received.
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