Employability, professionalization and social competences what role does the university play?

Abstract

This research has been done within a broader programme of studies on University Quality in its relation to the labour market. The objectives formulated were: 1)  to deepen on the achievement conditioning factors at university and the “underlying reasons”; 2) to know what  the influences exerted by some more “covert” factors at the time of entering the job market are, nowadays a very serious problem. It was done with UNCUYO and UTN students and graduates and it covered three time stages during which the economic and employability conditions in the country underwent changes. At the same time, educational reforms were made. The combination of different factors (based, personal, psychosocial, structural and pedagogical-institutional) over a period of two decades of university life showed what factors were predictive of achievement or failure. Quanti-qualitative methodology was used in 6 university schools (1987-2004), N=229 subjects. In this point, we focused on one psychosocial factor: Alignment. Somewhat surprisingly, it was observed that the lack of alignment constituted a predictive factor of the delay in the completion of university studies and worse positioning of the graduates in the job market. The results are important for the University Management in a context within which the level of failure in studies is considerable. They are also significant since the university context should be the environment in which  Professionalization and critical thinking, facing innovation and employability, should be developed, thus generating the social competences demanded by today’s job market (initiative, open-mindedness, capacity to listen) before the tacit and “consented” acceptance of the system of ideas.  The findings invite those who are responsible of managing the university and educating educators to reflect on the current strategies and practices in order to introduce changes and improvement.