Change the system

Academic Abdullah Al Shaiba says unless the education sector doesn’t alter its outlook, emiratisation will never truly happen.

In many countries, the relationship between higher education and industries exists within a framework of collaboration. The labour market transfers its requirements in terms of degrees and skills to the higher education institutions.

On the other hand, higher education institutes attempt to teach the appropriate skills and knowledge to graduates.

There are more expatriates

The labour market in the UAE has developed to the point that it has become an attractive target for expatriates more than nationals. As a result, there has been an emerging strategic challenge, which is the increasing level of unemployment among locals, particularly higher education graduates.

Estimates by Tanmia indicate that in 2004 the labour market in both and private sectors consisted of 9.3 per cent UAE citizens and 90.7 per cent the expatriates. In 2005 these percentages may have become 8.6 per cent and 91.4 per cent.

Although the government is trying to increase the number of national graduate employees in the private sector, it faced many difficulties. One is the lack in collaboration between the labour market and higher education institutions.

HCTs have an effective policy

The Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT) are the only known exception here.

They developed an effective policy to prepare graduates for the workplace in order to increase the number of qualified nationals.

One strategic objective of the institution is to become the pioneer in linking the requirements of employment with course design and delivery and to help graduates make the transition to successful jobs.

I believe the UAE not only needs to expand programmes such as those at the HCT, in order to accomplish the ideal outcomes of emiratisation, but it also needs a new educational system that connects the three major factors: the state, higher education and employment.

AL SHAIBA’S OBSERVATIONS

- Higher education institutes provide students with the skills and knowledge necessary to enter the workforce.

- They ensure graduates are flexible, have an ability and willingness to play a role in innovation, ability to manage uncertainties, have good communicative skills, and the ability to work in a team.

In Europe, many private organisations influence higher education institutions in order to offer the appropriate programmes. The purpose is to prepare the best graduates who would meet the needs of the various levels of jobs.

In Germany and the Netherlands, many industries regularly define conditions when accepting new graduate employees. The construction sector, for instance, requires employees to acquire extensive theoretical and practical preparation.

Tanmia says

National Human Resource Development and Employment Authority or Tanmia reports: "During the past two decades, three factors have shaped the local workforce: a demand for skills in the face of fast economic growth; a working age population that is increasingly younger; and a growing reliance on skilled and unskilled foreign labour."

Linking with the labour market

The labour market has several means of relaying its needs to educational institutes:

- The contribution of practitioners in developing the curriculum

- Part-time teaching by practitioners

- Providing students with the opportunity to complete internships prior to or during their course of study.