The San Pablo CEU University Foundation has created the Employability Advisory Council, which includes HR directors from leading companies in Spain, and whose objective is to build bridges between companies and universities
Employability for a young person looking for a job has to do with the characteristics that accompany this individual and that increase their probability of get a suitable job. There are several factors involved, however, it is important to note that among students who have not finished secondary education, the youth unemployment rate shoots up to 61.31% and that, in 2020, the youth unemployment rate in Spain it was the highest in the European Union, with 40.1%.
On the other hand, according to the INE, at the end of 2019, university graduates showed an activity rate of 93.6%. Four years after graduation, the unemployment rate stood at 8.0%. The question is no longer whether having studies, that is, good baggage for life, causes better employability, but rather in what sector they have been trained, in what specific field of knowledge and in what geographical area. These are precisely the determining factors for finding a job.
The data and conclusions on qualification, booming professions and job transition can be found in the report on “University youth and employability & rdquor; It has been published by Randstad Research and the San Pablo CEU University, and whose Rector, Rosa Visiedo, complements with the conviction that for a society to be great, it is essential to build a system that promotes employability. And for this, it is necessary to transfer specialized technical knowledge, but it is also necessary to teach students values, attitudes and personal skills that contribute to improving their professional and personal profile. That is, critical thinking, teamwork, creativity, communication skills, leadership, ethical commitment, solidarity… that today are highly valued by companies. It is not only about acquiring knowledge but mobilizing it and adding ethical values, attitude and personal skills to it.
University-Business Collaboration
Precisely to promote employability, the San Pablo CEU University Foundation has created the Employability Advisory Council, which includes human resources directors from leading companies in Spain, and whose objective is to build bridges between companies and universities, listen to companies to meet their needs in order to improve the employability of students, in addition to helping society, students, their families and ultimately to understand the present and future labor market in terms of employability. For Rosa Visiedo, this collaboration has several aspects. The first is institutional, since the good relationship between university and business is essential. And from there the others are derived. Another of them is the applied researcher, who urges a close collaboration and generates knowledge and tries to face present and future challenges. And then there is the side employability. This is well illustrated by the Aulas CEU-Empresa Program. A program that has included numerous companies and with which it is intended to generate an ecosystem of collaboration through the presence of companies in the university. CEU gives these companies a space in the university, a physical classroom, where the presence of the company is evident and, together with the students, certain joint projects are developed. For example, in the IBM program, students have participated in some challenges that consist of building a control panel for the services of the Madrid City Council. The novelty of this program is that it puts university students in a very direct relationship with the company. It is a way in which companies discover talent while students provide creative and innovative solutions. This has been very well received, with more than 20 classrooms in this academic year.
Vocations begin in childhood
One of the most powerful conclusions of the Ranstand Research and CEU study has to do with the choice of university studies since these mark a person’s life. And sometimes the decision is made without enough information. We know that today there are some 300,000 young people who are in this situation.
The type of university institution chosen also has to do with employability, with private ones surpassing public ones by four points. knowledge of languagesthe experience prior to work, which comes hand in hand with curricular or extracurricular internships – more than 5,000 students have done internships so far this year – or the geographical area where you study are determining factors in future employability. But there is a determining external factor when demanding a career and it is the market demand. In this sense, the STEM degrees They are having a growing demand because companies need graduates in these technical profiles. The difference is perceived when said business demand is not accompanied by student demand.
For Rosa Visiedo, the solution cannot reside in the moment of decision making, but in create vocations from the earliest stages of education: “From the CEU we try to complete the offer of STEM degrees and we have added others to the offer such as Animation Technology Engineering and Videogames, Digital Art, Mathematical Engineering, Science and Data Engineering and soon we will have a degree in Physics. All this means that the average job placement for a University like San Pablo CEU is over 95%. And another relevant fact is that a high percentage get their first job within four months. Visiedo states that, in this technical world, having disciplines in the humanities that form the backbone of higher education allows us to focus on the person. “The humanities allow us to reflect on technology from an ethical point of view. We try for students to learn it in their own subjects, but at the CEU you can take your own degree that we call Future, where we prepare students to successfully launch their professional future and in which many companies participate& rdquor ;.