A European educational network.
QUEST (Quality Education in Europe for Sustainable Social Transformation) is an independent, democratic network of schools and educational organisations working to promote transformative pedagogies.
Together with our members, we run research projects, training, conferences, and workshops, and work to influence education policy at the EU level, acting as a bridge between innovative schools and the wider system, and as a multiplier of the practices that work.
Connecting for
educational change
To connect educational actors in promoting an education centred in children’s rights, by fostering democratic, inclusive, and sustainable practices across Europe and beyond through action research, advocacy, exchanges, and training.
An education that values
every young person’s
voice, rights and possibilities.
A world where children and young people have equal access to an education – both formal and non-formal – that not only upholds their rights and agency, but also values their needs, aspirations, and contributions to a just and regenerative society.
Rooted in the everyday life of a school.
From the QUEST archive · Brussels
From local educational initiatives to a European movement for democratic, inclusive and sustainable education.
2017
Founded in Brussels
2022
A European network
+100
Members connected
In 2017, a group of parents, teachers and researchers opened a democratic outdoor school to bring transformative alternative to education in Brussels. The school was built around a simple but powerful idea: that children are competent, unique individuals, capable of shaping their own learning, and that education can nurture curiosity, freedom, connection and care.
Living these principles in practice also showed us how difficult it is for one school to challenge deeply rooted ways of thinking about education on its own. We realised that meaningful change needed connection: between practitioners and researchers, between schools and communities, and between what happens in classrooms and the policies that shape them.
Growing beyond our beginnings.
From there, QUEST began to grow beyond the walls of one school. We built partnerships across Europe, brought research into dialogue with practice, and started advocating for the conditions that allow transformative education to flourish. In 2022, QUEST formally became a European network – carrying the experience of our roots into a wider movement for change in education.
Our strategy
Capacitating
On democratic, sustainable and inclusive education.
- We create and share tools, training, methods, and examples that help teachers and educators put children’s rights into practice in everyday learning.
Connecting
Education organisations in Europe and beyond.
- We connect organisations across Europe and beyond, bringing together people working for more child-centred, democratic, inclusive, and sustainable education. We create a bridge between the experimental pedagogies developed in pioneer schools and the structures of mainstream education.
Advocating
For change in the European learning landscape.
- We work to make sure that children’s rights, participation, inclusion, and wellbeing are part of European conversations about education, so that the structural organisation of schools in Europe is designed in a way that is open and receptive to children-right based pedagogies.
Let’s shape
education together.
Connect with a European community working towards democratic, inclusive and sustainable education.