Set up in 1974 as the regional secretariat of the Catholic International Education Office (OIEC), the European Committee for Catholic Education (CEEC) is an international non-profit association (according to the Belgian law dated June 27, 1921). It is the cooperation tool for 29 Catholic education networks in 27 Central, Eastern and Western European countries: Albania, Austria, Belgium (Flemish and French speaking), Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, England & Wales, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland (Eire), Italy, Lithuania, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Scotland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Ukraine. CEEC is a meeting-point for the heads of these networks and a study and information centre. Moreover, it plays the role of a promoter of free Catholic education towards the various European bodies. CEEC represents about 35,000 schools and more than 8 million pupils.
In order to play an effective part in the field of education, CEEC wishes:
- to serve the education of young people and to study the fundamental principles of this education as well as the problems caused by their application;
- to defend and promote the interests of Catholic education with various official European bodies and all organisations interested in education at a European level.
- to promote the collaboration of its members in order to ensure didactical and pedagogical development and improvement of Catholic education;
- to encourage private initiatives as well as legal provisions taken at a national and at an international level in order to promote education in its various forms;
- to actively promote the effective carrying into practice of freedom of education as a fundamental condition for the functioning of a democratic society, in conformity with the Universal Declaration on Human Rights and with the additional Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights;
- to help its members, and more particularly the more underprivileged ones, in the fulfilment of their rights and duties;
- to highlight the complementary needs both of the educators and of the specific contribution of Catholic education to the educational project;
- to co-operate with other organisations participating in Catholic education at a European and international level.
Catholic pupils’ parents, represented by CEPEC (Christian European Parents – Parents Européens Chrétiens) and former pupils of Catholic schools represented by UNAEC–Europe (Union européenne des Anciens et Anciennes Elèves de l’Enseignemetn Catholique) are associate members of CEEC.
Presidency
Spain – represented by Don. José María ALVIRA DUPLÁ, delegated by the Escuelas Católicas, Madrid
General Secretariat
Mr Louis-Marie PIRON, Secretary General
Ms Géraldine VALLÉE, administrative & financial assistant
contact: ceec@ceec.be
Representative in CoGREE: Mr Louis-Marie PIRON
You want to know more about it? Visit http://ceec.be/