Evaluating the Effectiveness of an Extracurricular Teacher Education Training Program for DigCompEdu Competences

In the ongoing era of digital transformation, it is imperative for teachers to equip learners with essential digital competences to navigate the intricacies of the digital landscape successfully. As future in-service teachers function as role models and educators for the proper use of digital technology, pre-service teachers must develop adequate digital proficiency. This holds particularly true in Germany, where the prevailing competence levels of pre-service teachers are reportedly suboptimal. To this end, an extracurricular training program for pre-service teachers, based on the DigCompEdu framework, was implemented from 2021 to 2024, coinciding with COVID-19 pandemic-related limitations. A total of 242 pre-service teachers registered for the program, and 40 completed it. Employing a pre–post design, we assessed (1) attitudes towards digital technology and digital learning, (2) competence beliefs, and (3) test-based competences. Pre–post comparisons show an improvement only in participants’ confidence in deploying digital technologies for subject-specific purposes. Unexpectedly, no other statistically significant differences were observed. These findings point at shortcomings in the program, which are discussed to highlight potential areas for refinement and improvement in future programs and curricular implementation.