Students across the EU believe hard skills and good grades are low on the priority list for employers.
Differences of opinion on the of role of university education are discouraging student bodies from engaging on employment issues, a new study suggests. The survey of European student unions, presented at the European Students’ Convention in Brussels on March 19, shows that some have no involvement with employers, or seek to limit contacts.
“We were quite shocked to find that there are a few unions that don’t need or simply don’t want co-operation with employers,” said Nevena Vuksanovic, project co-ordinator with the European Students’ Union. “This might be from previous experience, where they couldn’t understand each other on what the agenda should be and how curricula should be developed.”
Other unions accept the need to involve employers in higher education, but want to limit their influence. “For example, they can sit on the boards of higher education institutions, but they should not vote; they should only be advisers,” said Vuksanovic.
Underlying this reluctance to engage is a fear that employers want to focus university programmes on the short-term needs of the labour market rather than broader educational goals. “As we could hear from the discussions here, students are quite pessimistic regarding that,” she said at the convention. “Because the labour market is constantly changing, you simply cannot develop higher education that will be applicable.”
However, there are signs that many student unions are also not participating in the broader processes for restructuring higher education, such as the development of learning outcomes and national qualification frameworks, brought in under the Bologna reforms.
In this instance, the problem appears to be ignorance, with 59% saying that they were not aware of the mechanisms. “It’s surprising that students still have a huge lack of knowledge on the structural implementation of the Bologna process in their own institutions,” said Vuksanovic.
The study has alarmed the European Commission, which funded the research. “Personally, I find some of the results of the project pretty depressing,” said Adam Tyson, head of the higher education unit in the Commission’s directorate-general for education and culture, who was also speaking at the convention.
In particular he cited student union perceptions of the potential for graduate level employment (see above) and their engagement with their institutions when looking at questions of employability. “There are very big differences between countries, and that is something that we clearly need to work on together.”
He also expressed surprise at the finding that 78% of respondents felt employers were not aware of the value of a bachelor degree. “We need to understand the perception that bachelors are not so employable when, if you look at the statistics, they actually are,” he said. “There are differences between perception and reality that need to be looked at.”
Asked about the skills students need to succeed in the job market, respondents gave a high priority to social skills such as teamwork and practical experience from work placements or internships. These were followed in importance by communication and language skills, and only then by ‘hard’ skills such as knowledge acquired and good grades.
“Students have been influenced a lot by the current discourse on employability, skills and competences,” said Vuksanovic. “They are looking more into the soft skills that they can get from universities and they think that this is a priority for them to get a job tomorrow. But we were quite surprised that we got a high percentage thinking that knowledge and hard skills are not that important compared to soft skills.”
Recent employer surveys show that the match between degree content and the job specification is still decisive in hiring decisions. Soft skills are valued, but often taken for granted as part of a university education.
Ian Mundell is a freelance journalist based in Brussels.