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Tuesday, 17 July 2012

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A future for u’grads



Dean Faculty of Arts, University of
Colombo,Professor Athula Ranasinghe
Picture by Saman Sri Wedage

Kasun was one of the cleverest students in his class. He devoted most of his time to studies to achieve his aim of obtaining entrance to the university. It was a letter that declared the joyful news that he had been selected to one of the universities in town. He knew that a new page in his life will soon turn which will pull himself and his family out of the jaws of poverty. As traveling daily from his home town Galle was impossible, he decided to stay at the boy’s hostel in the university premises. Life in the commercial city of the country and life at the university was nothing of what he imagined. Many times the thought of giving up crossed his mind but the hopes of his parents and siblings did not let him do so.

As time elapsed, he fought his way through to final year bearing up all miseries. Cramming his head with all the lecture notes he faced the final exam with lots of hope and finally got through making his parents proud of him. His next task was to get employment. When he walked in for the first interview he had an air of dignity around him because he was equipped with his degree certificate. But all the hopes died when he was told he had not got adequate qualifications. After that each and every interview he faced told him that holding a degree alone cannot earn him a job of his dreams. Now his degree certificate lies in a dusty corner of the house and Kasun is desperately waiting for a suitable job. This can be the story of the several thousands of unemployed graduates.

A voice for their rights!

Finding an enduring solution to educated unemployment which is not a new phenomenon has become a challenge to the authorities in the country. Graduates who follow courses in humanities and social sciences face this situation more than those who follow engineering, medicine or science subjects.

Skills necessary

From an unemployed graduate’s point of view, years of studying under difficult conditions become in vain when the suitable job remains out of reach. From the employer’s perspective, a degree alone is not sufficient for a job. Skills and competencies required are lacking in people.

The merits of an education in humanities and social sciences are recognized worldwide. When a student learns about history, religion, society or languages she is not only learning the subject. Ideally such learning cultivates an inquisitive mind, problem solving skills critical thinking abilities.


Asking for justice!

An independently thinking person with knowledge, skills carrying a world view associated with social justice, human rights and peace is an important person in today’s society. Thus the authorities have a great responsibility by them.

Dean Faculty of Arts, University of Colombo,Professor Athula Ranasinghe expressed his views on this issue.

“Unemployment of graduates is a trend that has been observed over a few years. With privatization government’s ability to absorb graduates has been reduced. In the private sector production level is different and different skills are required such as data analysis, Information Technology and knowledge of English. In the faculty of Art or Humanities non of the subjects are job oriented,” he said.

“It is a fact that graduates are unemployed and those who are employed are under employed. They are not doing the job they are trained for. Our economy has not expanded enough and the labour market of the country is of a different nature. Until very recently civil administrative jobs were only for arts graduates. But now there is an exodus of agriculture graduates. Social science graduates are the actual people for these positions but they are employed for other clerical work. Their skills are not used,” he added.

Professor Ranasinghe however believes that it is best to adjust to the labour market requirements. “We have realized that we have to adjust to the labour market. These students in the university comprise of the best students and they spend three to four years with us in the university. In that context these youngsters are our responsibility. Yet you cannot incorporate job oriented subjects into the degree programme. Thus we have introduced soft skills such as Information Technology, presentation skills, team work, time management, personality and skills development and English language. Most of the departments have taken the initiative to implement these short courses. At the same time the government is also conducting leadership programmes at the national level,” he said.

Attitudinal change

“In addition to that, the attitudes of the graduates about jobs have to be changed. When they step out of the university they look for jobs unconditionally in the government sector. Most of the graduates have a negative attitude about the world affairs and at time they are disappointed even about themselves. In a recent research done by our university showed that in the first year undergraduates were determined to obtain jobs in the private sector.

As they approached the third and the fourth years majority were looking for public sector employment,” Professor added. He says that a link between the universities and the private sector should be established to solve this problem. “The lack of institutional level links creates unemployment. To address this issue we have started to send our undergraduates to private sector companies for professional internships. These undergraduates work four days a week in these firms. This helps in the change of attitude in both parties. Management of these firms realise the skills of the graduates,” he said.

Professor also highlighted the responsibility of media in tackling this issue. “Media has created a stigma in the society. Arts graduates are considered as unwanted.

Not job oriented

They always highlight the fights between the faculties. Although fights erupt there are positive things taking place, such as blood donation campaigns, literary festivals which are completely ignored by the media. Media also has a responsibility not to tarnish the image of a graduate,” he added.

Meanwhile the Ministry of Higher Education is keen to solve this issue which impacts country’s economy. “We are calculating the employment ratio in each and every faculty of all the universities in the country.

The recent statistics that we collected shows that the employability of the Arts graduates is low. But engineering and medicine fields hold a high ratio of employability. There are many arts graduates but their subjects are not job oriented. There are no jobs suitable for them in the labour market. So we are introducing new areas where jobs are available such as Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), hospitality industry, information technology (IT), tourism and tri lingual teachers,” Secretary to the Ministry, Dr. Sunil Nawaratne said.

The ministry also runs projects such as Improving Relevance and Quality of Undergraduate Education (IRQUE) which is assisted by the World Bank. Under this project all universities are encouraged to ensure quality and relevance in all their undergraduate courses while improve English language competency, IT skills and instilling positive social values.


Behind the scenes

 

Making the point clear

The misery!

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