March 16, 2020

How are young universities nurturing talent?

Ahead of the upcoming Communications of the European Commission on the Renewed European Research Area, on the European Education Area and on the updating of the Skills Agenda, it is high time to talk about the employability of our students and researchers. As a network of young, dynamic and research-driven universities, YERUN members share a strong commitment to strengthen the employability of their students and researchers who are the employees, knowledge workers, entrepreneurs and citizens of tomorrow. Graduate Employability touches upon the discussions on the future of skills, the future of work, challenges of digitalisation and the role of education and research in our societies. With that in mind, YERUN collected practices from our institutions implemented at various levels (Bachelor, Master, PhD or postdoc) that are having an impact in the career of our graduates with a view of sharing and starting a dialogue with other universities and stakeholders. 

In this way, YERUN members prepare their students and graduates to become confident, agile and innovative global citizens. In order to achieve this ambition, YERUN members are keen to experiment with new methods in their educational approaches, as proven by the collection of practices presented in this guide. We want to thank our YERUN Working Group on Graduate Employability, lead by Jacob Krummes (SDU) Karen Vandevelde (Antwerp University), all YERUN members participating in sharing their practices and last but not least, our three YERUN students that have helped us enormously with the development of the report.

With the publication of this guide, YERUN hopes to inspire other universities and to trigger a discussion on the topic of employability of students and early career researchers.  

“This is the beginning of what we hope an active dialogue with other universities, stakeholders and policy makers, in the hope of identifying lessons learnt on common challenges and recommendations for the future. Reach us if you want to further engage!”, Silvia Gomez Recio, YERUN Secretary General.  

You can download “Food for Careers: YERUN inspirational practices on enhancing Graduate Employability” here.

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