The VSD II project, jointly funded by the Swiss and German Governments, is being implemented by GIZ in Mongolia. The project supports both long-term formal vocational education and short-term skills trainings in selected trades with the aim of increasing the employability of rural and urban women and men.
Finding work in their chosen field is a challenge for many graduates of technical and vocational and higher education institutions, with the youth unemployment rate reaching 20.8 percent in 2016 - almost triple the national average. A lack of career counselling is one of the reasons underpinning the growing number of jobless youth.
And while there has been a resurgence of the vocational orientation and counselling sector in Mongolia since 2009 driven by support from international development agencies, gaps remained in the provision of professional career counselling services.
With technical support from the German Federal Employment Agency’s University of Applied Labour Studies and the backing of Mongolia’s Ministry of Labour and Social Protection and Ministry of Education, Culture, Science and Sports, the VSD II Project introduced the Master of Arts in Career Studies degree at the National University of Mongolia (NUM) in the 2017-2018 academic year to strengthen the professional qualifications of career counsellors.
Of the 26 students enrolled in the 18-month course, 14 work in public employment and social welfare services, and the benefits are already evident to their employers.
“We are very thankful that E. Purevsuren, a social worker in charge of projects in our organisation, has been applying the knowledge and information he has learned through the Master of Arts in Career Studies course, such as people’s reintegration into the workforce, and working with vulnerable groups,” said N. Nergui, Senior Methodologist at the Social Protection Special Centre of the Ulaanbaatar Mayor’s Office.
In spring 2018, the Master degree students conducted their first individual counselling sessions with high school and under-graduate students as a part of their practical trainings.
M. Aitolkin, a under-graduate student at NUM’s School of Applied Sciences, was so satisfied with the professional guidance she received from the master’s degree students that she encouraged her friends and academic peers to seek a professional career counselling.
“The students of the Career Studies programme provided me with very valuable counselling,” she said. “I was torn between several majors, but now I know what I want to do. Should such an opportunity be provided again, I would be one of the first people to come, and I would bring along my friends and fellow students.”
D. Erdenezaya, who also studies at the School of Applied Sciences, said the career counselling she received provided her with information that had not previously been available to her.
“We really lack this kind of information,” she said. “This is the first time I have attended such an event. I feel this is really useful, and I will definitely attend again if another such event is organized.”
In order to meet the demand for the Master course outside Ulaanbaatar, the VSD II Project supported the NUM in developing and launching a Distance Learning Programme - the first of its kind to bridge the urban-rural gap by bringing an academic programme to students in soums and aimags with limited access to post-graduate studies in the field. At present, more than 20 students have enrolled in Distance Learning Programme and 15 in the on-campus course. The third-semester students who enrolled in 2017 will graduate in January 2019.
In addition, the Federal University of Applied Labour Studies’ continued technical support, facilitated by the VSD II Project, culminated in the signing of a long-term cooperation agreement with the NUM in May 2018. As part of that agreement, professors from both universities are jointly supervising the first Mongolian PhD student to research national vocational-orientation issues.
The first joint research project on career counselling is also planned for 2019, as are future faculty and student exchanges between the two universities.
