The History of GPEN

The idea to establish a global network for Protestant education came up in preparation of the celebration of the 500 year jubilee of the Reformation, in 2017 in Germany. Delegates from 17 countries on 5 continents came together in the Netherlands in 2016 to agree on a common vision on Protestant education: ‘Establishing Common Ground for Protestant Schools’.

In the course of time, a community was built around the GPEN website of circa 1000 educational institutions listed as participants of the network. A core group of so called ambassadors was formed consisting of school leaders, education officers from churches and representatives of national associations of Protestant schools. Meetings in Germany were followed by conferences in Rwanda (2017), Tanzania (2018) and Ghana (2023), as well as several digital meetings, such as a series of webinars (‘GPEN Teachers Academy’) on digitalisation in Protestant education in 2025.

Several materials and tools were developed to support global collaboration and exchanges (e.g. on peace education and the project called ‘Seeds of Hope’ at the time of the global pandemic).

GPEN has also given voice to Protestant education on the global level together with our partners in the area of advocacy.