ALMALAUREA CONFERENCE 2010

2010 is the year in which many aims of the united Europe are expected to be achieved. However, although the year 2010 has already started, the achievement of many aims is still far. The economic situation hovers between signs of recovery, which are hopefully an anticipation of the future, and negative impacts on employment, which lately register the effects of the global crisis. This phase is having a particular impact on Italy. On the one hand Italy has been protected by its own backwardness; on the other hand this country knows that a fast advance is necessary to come put of the crisis. One of the main fields which is crucial for the future of Europe and Italy is the way the human capital is trained and used. A pivot role in the economic, social and environmental sustainability of the future development programmes is played by human resources. The demand for places of work and new professional skills is increasingly connecting the job demand and offer within settings that are complex, but also full of risks and opportunities.

The programme of the AlmaLaurea National Meeting that will take place on Friday 19th March 2010 in Cosenza, hosted by the local university, will deal with this issue according to the conventional approach. The results of the 12th ALMALAUREA survey on graduates’ employment conditions will also be presented during the meeting, The study focuses on 162 thousand students who achieved the post-reform first- or second-level degree in 2008 and who have been interviewed one year on from graduation and approximately 50 thousand pre-reform graduates of the graduation summer sessions of 2006 and 2004, who have been interviewed respectively three and five years on from graduation. It offers a very interesting picture of the situation, which is still open toward further analysis. On the whole 185 thousand interviews of graduates have been carried out in 49 Italian universities. The response rate reached about as much as 90%.

The survey enables the universities taking part in the AlmaLaurea Consortium, which in the meanwhile have become 601, to obtain in a short time the data required for universities by the Ministry of Education, University and Research through the decree on the transparency of information (DM 544/2007; DD 61/2008). Since these data cover the whole population of graduates, they offer a full detailed report that includes breakdowns by individual degree course. Just like the previous meetings, the this year programme also includes a further analysis of the main subjects, after the presentation of the report of AlmaLaurea.
A comparative point of view will also be applied in this context to the issue of "over-education". Field interpretations and evidence-based practices will be examined thoroughly, so that the extension and the characteristics of a phenomenon that is very crucial form the point of view of both data interpretation and policies to be applied can be evaluated.

The comparison between the forecasted hiring (source: Excelsior) and the actual ones (source: AlmaLaurea) in 2009 will also be particularly interesting. The comparison, based on a real integration between the information contained in the two data banks, will be don for the first time.

Moreover, a further analysis, which had already been presented a few years ago and which deals with the investments in human capital made by both Italian and foreign companies, will be updated and enriched. It is an anlysis of the professional status, which has been carried out on the basis of text-mining methods. The classification of the professional status will be referred to all the other variables taken into consideration by AlmaLaurea, including those quoted by the graduates themselves in their CVs, which have been published on the web site of AlmaLaurea and are available to the companies.

Another two analysis integrate the study. The first one is the analysis of both the strategies set by graduates to find a job and their toime-to-enrty into the labour market. The strategies will be related to the chacateristics of graduates, in order to identify the most effective ones. The second one is the presentation of the model that has been elaborated for AlmaOrièntati (AlmaGuideYourself) and its guiding path for choosing the right university and it is based on the comparison between different generations of graduates. More specifically, the aim is to evaluate if there were any changes in the satisfaction of the young graduates during the last few years due to the current labour market conditions.

The presentation of the balance made by universities in terms of the professional success achieved by their graduates is one of the most important events for the academic system. Moreover, this presentation also offers this year the opportunity to examine closely some issues that are crucial for the future of Italy.

¹ The following universities have recently taken part in the Consortium: S. Pio V University of Rome, University “Federico II” of Neaples, University “L’Orientale” of Neaples, University “Parthenope” of Neaples, Marche Polytechnic University, Polytechnic University of Bari and the University of Insubria.