[english]
INTRODUCTION


This project responds to the needs of Vietnamese higher education institutions. Unemployment of university graduates in Vietnam may partly stem from a mismatch between the education offered, and the demands of the labor market. The feedback from the labor market seems to underline this, but employers also mention a lack of “soft” competencies in newly graduated job applicants. The responses from graduates suggested a lack of actors bridging between universities and employers, while MOLISA has stated that there is a surplus of graduates recently given the countries current economy. Moreover, information on the real state of employment of university graduates is not enough for both universities in developing the curriculums and MOET and MOLISA in their management

Objectives

The wider objective of the project is to increase employability of university graduates in Vietnam. To reach to the central objectives, the project attempts to work towards the specific objectives as following:
• to identify the main characteristics of the labor-market insertion processes of the University graduates through a survey study addressed to the graduates from five Vietnamese Universities.
• to provide information about the employment status, the working conditions and the characteristics of the job of the graduates.
• to analyze the job search processes and strategies and their effectiveness in the different segments of the labor market.
• to provide indicators about the utility of their University education and the Diploma obtained in getting a job, the job quality (in terms of fit to the Diploma, job salary, job satisfaction, etc.) and their work performance.
• to inform about the graduates unemployed and those inactive.

Functions

The tracer studies aim to fulfill among others, the following functions:
• to provide feedback to the HEI to improve the redesign of the curricula taught and better respond to the demands of the labor market;
• to provide relevant information for the youth and their families concerning occupational information that is relevant for vocational orientation and guidance,
• to offer indicators to evaluate the effectiveness to increase the graduates’ employability of the HEI as well as the orientation and evaluation of higher education policies.
• To offer a tool for other Universities to perform a tracer study according to their needs and aims.