Context The fragility of young people in the labor market and the increasing instability of the transition from education are globally recognized by OECD and the International Labour Organization. The mismatch between the skills of young people entering the labor market and the skills sought and valued by employers poses additional challenge to the transition of young people to work and consequent emancipation and independence. Besides the need for matching skills identified by the EC as New Skills for New Jobs initiative, studies such as Bennett (2002) and Ferguson (2010) show the importance of shared understanding about the skills sought by employers, so that educational institutions can adapt their curricula and the young job applicants can prepare themselves in the best way. The McKinsey report "Education to Employment: Getting Europe's Youth Into Work-The road with many barriers", 2014 highlights that one of the reasons for the mismatch is the lack of or poor communication between education institutions and employers. Thus emerges a clear need for better dialogue not only between educational institutions and employers, but rather a dialogue involving all stakeholders, from the young people, communities and local authorities to the government. Project aims BEGIN is an European social innovation project that aims to develop a comprehensive programme that will boost HE students soft skills and, at the same time, contribute do diminish the gap between skills in demand in the labor market and the skills offered by HE courses, by promoting a programme of career exploration activities and an initiative to engage into systematic and permanent dialogue HE institutions, employers and all relevant stakeholders: HE students, community, local/regional authorities and other organisations across EU. Target groups The target groups addressed by the project represent the main labor market actors that can contribute towards reducing unemployment among young graduates: - HE Students from universities’ faculties/courses with lower levels of employability - HE Teachers and other academic staff - HE Stakeholders: companies, social economy organizations, local/regional/national authorities, students’ associations/representatives, previous students from the involved HEIs and EU organizations Expected outcomes The project will result in three complementary intellectual outputs - BEGIN Toolbox for career exploration activities – partner will implement various career exploration activities and document the experience of students, employers and academic staff during the planning, execution and follow-up. The Toolbox will serve as a know-how and inspiration tool to other HEIs, proving guidelines based on real experience of partner universities. - BEGIN Practical methodology for joint Business-Education Initiatives - a comprehensive tool equipping successful professionals with a step by step mentoring plan and guidelines on how to effectively pass their knowledge to their mentees and develop the skills they would like their future employees to have. - BEGIN training course for Soft Skills & Personal Development - open e-learning training material that will boost HEI’s staff qualification and thus serve as tool for boosting students’ soft skills, demanded by both contemporary and future labor market. It will aid universities to adopt a proactive approach towards preparation of students by teaching them not only soft skills demanded by the nowadays market, but also by future labor market, such as cognitive load management; virtual collaboration; social intelligence; novel and adaptive thinking; cross-cultural competences, etc. The three outputs of BEGIN form a comprehensive programme triangle that addresses each of the main labor market stakeholders: HE students, academic staff and employers. Thus an integrated set of knowledge resources and practical tools is formed that contributes to the permanent engagement between the 3 target groups and boosts HE students’ soft skills portfolio, so as to promote better integration of HE graduates in labor market, reduce youth unemployment and shrink the gap between skills offered and skills needed on the present and future labor market.
The project aimed to develop a comprehensive programme that would boost Higher Education (HE) students soft skills and, at the same time, contribute do diminish the gap between skills in demand in the labor market and the skills offered by HE courses, by promoting a programme of career exploration activities and an initiative to engage into systematic and permanent dialogue HE institutions, employers and all relevant stakeholders: HE students, community, local/regional authorities and other organisations across EU.
Soft skills are like a bridge between technical qualifications gained at academic level and employers’ expectations who search for oriented and confident students prepared for the business. The Theory of Change (ToC) of the BEGIN project lays in the approach assuming if Higher Education (HE) students are equipped in soft skills required at the labour market already at the university level, then they are more likely to pursue a better career after graduating. The project consortium addressed the needs for boosting soft skills among HE students.