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Introduction New social and economic challenges of the first and second decade of this century encourage state governments and international organizations to look for solutions, which would allow to mitigate the results of the crisis and establish mechanisms for shaping educational and professional perspectives for young Europeans. One of the tools for shaping better prospects for acquiring competences, and consequently for employability, is mobility. For many years it has been an inherent part of European educational programmes such as Leonardo da Vinci, Comenius and Erasmus, the last of which has operated since 1987 and benefited almost 2.5 mln people. However, at present, the education and labour market is filling with a generation of young people shaped in a different learning environment who are proficient with electronic media, who display a different approach to information and communication and who require altered teaching and training methods. A number of complex aspects of benefiting from learning mobility has been the subject of expert discussions during the conference entitled Mobility as a Tool to Acquire and Develop Competences from Childhood to Seniority coorganised in Sopot on 17–19 October 2011 by the Ministry of National Education and Foundation for the Development of the Education System. This publication is fully devoted to that event. Moreover, adoption of conclusions on a benchmark for learning mobility by the Council in November 2011 was also a great success of the Polish Presidency. Setting the goals and priorities for educational polices of the European Union for the years to come provides for the global context and the goals related to raising the competitiveness of our continent and building of knowledge-based economy. These goals have guided for many years educational programmes implemented by the Foundation for the Development of the Education System: Lifelong Learning Programme, Youth in Action programme, and earlier, since 1990s, the Socrates and Youth programmes. Investments in education, and mainly in shaping lifelong learning competences should be continued, therefore the first strategic goal of ET 2020 (Council Conclusions of 2009) has been formulated as Making lifelong learning and mobility a reality. In its justification it has been stated that the challenges posed by demographic change and the regular need to update and develop skills in line with changing economic and social circumstances call for a lifelong approach to learning and for education and training systems which are more responsive to change and more open to the wider world. Mobility as a method for achieving the expected level of general competences, which can contribute to a greater openness of educational systems seems to have all attributes for the establishment of more flexible learning pathways – including better transitions between the various