Page 4 - euroguidance-insight-newsletter-2014-spring

University Contact Point

University Contact Point will be the facilita-
tor for the transition from education to working life
Economic development is the main focal point of all modern
societies and governments have been paying more attention
to it over the past few decades. Particularly, they are looking
for a way to safeguard employment and to create new jobs by
enhancing labour force participation, especially in young peo-
ple. As many young people have graduated from high school, at
minimum, the close relationship between universities and the
labour market is the major component of the transition from
education to the working life. In this regard, the importance of
counselling to these young people has become more prominent.
The Turkish Employment Organization (İŞKUR) is the national
employment institution and, since 2009, the national represent- The congress had seven topics:
ative of Euroguidance. İŞKUR implements guidance and counsel-
ling services in an effort to safeguard employment and increase 1. Career decision making: learning and working
the number of jobs available. Turkey has a large young popu- pathways/selection processes/career develop-
lation which constitutes a large part of the labour force. Euro- ment within or outside of the workplace;
guidance Turkey reaches these young people through İŞKUR’s 2. Development of career management skills;
employment and vocational counsellors approximately 3900 all 3. Factors that have an impact on career develop-
over the Turkey- with some activities and promotion materials. ment;
Euroguidance Turkey held its first International Career Guid- 4. Individual attitudes/preferences and labour
ance and Counselling Congress on the 28th and 29th of force needs;
November, 2013. The congress took place in Ankara and 5. Resources, methods and practitioner qualifica-
some 40 papers were presented in 11 sessions. Approx- tions and competencies in career guidance and
imately 500 people participated, from the career guid- counselling;
ance field, universities, stakeholder institutions and guid- 6. Quality management systems, standards and
ance practitioners. The main aims of the Congress were to: evi dence-based policies and practices in
lifelong guidance;
• share and promote academic studies in the field of 7. Specific target groups
career guidance and counselling ;
• support the career guidance and counselling field
in terms of learning from scientific studies; and One of the main outputs of the congress was to build a
• build the resource-pool for developing career guid- close relationship between guidance practitioners and uni-
ance and counselling services based on academic versity career centres, which is required in order to improve
studies. and increase youth employment and youth entrepreneur-
ship. It was decided that the University Contact Point will
be a facilitator for the transition from education to working
life. By giving young people proper guidance and counsel-
ling, the young Turkish labour force will make an easy tran-
sition from education to working life. According to recent
statistics, there were nearly 5.5 million university students
in Turkey at the end of March of 2014. If the country utilises
this potential, it can make a big contribution to its econom-
ic development. Therefore, University Contact Points have
been set up in 68 universities and their number is growing.

www.euroguidance.net

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