Employability management in adult education and training

Abstract

Romania's new Higher Education Law from 2023 aims to increase the number of graduates of adult training programs. The law also introduces the international standard for education and international standards for professional training of adults, while Romania's system of education and professional training is in line with the requirements of the labor market. As far as the equivalence of the study programs is concerned, we can no longer say that this criterion is also met because until this law was passed, we would not have implemented ISCED, but we have the fields of studies promoted by the Government Decision, that is impossible to be assimilated internationally. We have over 6,000 bachelor and master programs related to about 1,500 occupations in the Classification of Occupations from Romania (COR) and the classification of European Skills, Competences and Occupations (ESCO), which is unimaginable in European countries. More than half of these should be at most postgraduate programs for adults. Study programs remain a problem in equating studies, especially in the technical field, except for European regulated professions and IT where the equating is automatic. Passing post-graduate professional training for adults on either occupational or qualification standards will largely solve this impasse in the next five/six years. It makes sense to analyze employability as we have done here in case of increased mobility of Romanian qualified workforce on the European labor market, but according to the signed accession treaty, it must be understood that this does not come automatically, but as we have seen there are certain obligations and commitments of the Member State, conditions to be ensured so that it is as easy as possible for the graduate to be employed at the level held and the graduated field of study.