Redeem – wp 1 – State of the art Content

2Employability and Joint Programs

2.1Employability of young graduates

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  no universally accepted definition
  
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  definitions depends on the context
  
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    EHEA: learning process, a graduate’s achievement and potential to acquire a job
    
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    EU: actual acquisition of a job and graduates’ success on the labour market
    
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  employability as one of the main ideas behind a harmonised higher education system in Europe (Sorbonnne Declaration 1998)
  
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    Bologna declaration 1999: “citizens’ employability”
    
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    Prague 2001: focus on “graduate employability”
    
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  Definition by Bologna Follow-up group: “Employability is the ability to gain initial employment, to maintain employment and to be able to move around within the labour market.”
  
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  student is at the center of development of employability in higher education Student Advancement of Graduates’ Employability project (sage): “Employability Employability is a broad concept which includes subject-specific, methodological, social and individual competences which enable graduates to successfully take up and pursue a profession/employment and empower their life-long learning. Employability is also about making graduates more likely to gain employment in their chosen field(s), being able to create/start new businesses, and being able to develop and succeed in their occupations.”
  
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  Students seek out for international competency offered by joint programs in order to fit best into the global labour market (Faethe, Brenn-White 2013)
  
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  European and national determination to promote the European dimension in HE and graduate employability (European Higher Education Area Communiqués)
  
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  Against the background of economic crisis in EU data shows that higher education graduates have suffered from the crisis but still the unemployment ratio are the lowest for young people with high educational attainment in most countries (EHEA Bologna Implementation Report 2016: 208). One can assume that this should be even more right for graduates having two national degrees. Although almost all EHEA countries identify employability as a policy concern, the tools and efforts change from country to country. HEI have great autonomy and an important role to play. Including work placements in the curriculum (preferably abroad), improving career guidance services, monitoring performance with established feedback mechanisms, but also encouraging student mobility or the implementation of Bologna tools (EHEA Bologna Implementation Report 2016: 208).
  
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  Employability as an issue which is often addressed but not yet sufficiently researched
  
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    German-French University’s employability study as an example
    
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  Politecnico di Torino: provides for students career guidance, services aimed at promoting their integration into the world of work and the monitoring of their specific career plans; it promotes initiatives to create qualified jobs; it pursues initiatives to maintain an individual and cultural bond with alumni (Statute of the Politecnico di Torino, 2011).
  
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  Politecnico di Torino, through a central unit called “Stage & Job Placement Unit” offers a support to companies and students or graduates to enhance the job matching. This unit matches demand and offer of online internship and job vacancies, manages paperwork and monitors internships through surveys and questionnaires. It carries on different activities in the areas of monitoring as well as promotion. Through an observatory, the Stage & Job unit aims to monitor the effectiveness of internships offered and improve the quality of the students’ work experience. In career counseling, this unit also offers professional and career guidance through individual support for students writing their resume, preparing interviews and conducting job search. Thematic workshops of the Stage & Job unit give students and graduates the practical and theoretical tools to enter the world of work (e.g. soft skills training, etc.). Furthermore, this unit maintains specific collaborations with companies and events such as regular on campus events, career days, specific job and orientation fairs and visits to industrial plants. These activities are dedicated to all POLITO students; no specific focus is dedicated to DD students, but occasionally companies were supported in hiring DD students and graduates, being interested in specific nationalities or language competences.
  
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  POLITO carries on no specific activities on monitoring employability but it is a member of ALMALAUREA, a consortium of Italian universities with the support of the Ministry of Education, University and Research. Its task is to monitor graduates' characteristics and performances and to make a comparison between different courses and universities.
  

Almalaurea produces a yearly report on graduates' employment situation; it has no specific analysis on DD but there is the concrete possibility to enhance and deepen the report.

This report examines the employment condition of graduates after one, three and five years from the graduation (employment conditions, time needed by graduates for accessing the labour market, kind of contract, earnings, effectiveness of a degree for finding a job)

2.1.1National definitions of employability

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  Importance of young graduate’s employability seen from the national perspective inside the EU
  

Italy: In Italy Regional laws define the accreditation/authorization procedures and the services that can be provided. Each Region has a list of operators in possession of precise requirements, such as:

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  Public Employment Services (Centri per l’Impiego)
  
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  Private Employement Services (Employment agencies, Recruitment agencies, Agencies to support the relocation, etc.)
  
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  Subjects under special authorization (Universities, schools, etc.)
  

POLITO, according to the national law, improves the link with the world of work through:

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   Creation of courses responding to specific requests from the world of work;
   
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   Valorization of internships in companies, public bodies and cultural institutions, with attention to critical factors for the success of these initiatives, such as selection of the hosting subject, duration of the placement and quality of tutors;
   
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   Periodic verification of employment issues for to the various courses and dissemination of results within the University.