One of the objectives of the Feldenkrai4Life project is to make a contribution to bringing this figure to the fore and the attention of national and international institutions.
The Feldenkrais teacher has existed since Moshe Feldenkrais (1904-1984), the founder of the Method, became its first and became famous due to his successes with many well-known personalities from politics, music and arts, but also and above all with the many people, children and adults, suffering from congenital syndromes and illnesses or from trauma whose videos still exist while working with him (IFF – International Feldenkrais Federation (feldenkrais-method.org)
For decades, many teachers have been working all over the world. In Europe, Feldenkrais associations or guilds gather more than 3000 practitioners (3093, Source: IFF 2023) although there are many more active non-associated ones.
But how much do labour institutions know about this reality? How much is this professional figure activity present in the existing professional frameworks in the various European countries where they operate?
The NACE classification of economic activities in the European Community is used by EuroStat for a wide range of European economic, social, environmental and agricultural statistics. The national classifications of the member countries refer to it.
NACE rev2.1 is now official and with it the “courses of awareness through movement’ – a cornerstone of Feldenkrais practice – are now officially mentioned in section Q – Education of the classification under code 85.59 ‘Other education n.e.c.’!
This may seem like a small achievement but, on the contrary, it is very important to open up the recognition of Feldenkrais activities also in national classifications of economic activities that are based on the European classification.