EURASIAN HIGHER EDUCATION LEADERS’ FORUM 11-12 June 2015, Astana, Kazakhstan GRADUATE EMPLOYABILITY IN THE 21st CENTURY CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS UDC 378 (063) LBC 74.58 E68 Editors: Aida Sagintayeva and Kairat Kurakbayev, Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education E68 EURASIAN HIGHER EDUCATION LEADERS’ FORUM 2015, CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS. – Astana, IndigoPrint Llp., 2015, 104 p. ISBN 978-601-80467-8-0 UDC 378 (063) LBC 74.58 ISBN 978-601-80467-8-0 © Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education, 2015 3 CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS . 5 CONFERENCE STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBERS . 6 CONTRIBUTORS . 7 PREFACE . 8 Aida Sagintayeva and Kairat Kurakbayev OVERVIEW SESSION GRADUATE EMPLOYABILITY IN THE 21st CENTURY . 10 Aslan Sarinzhipov THE FUTURE OF GRADUATES IN THE GLOBAL LABOUR MARKET . 13 Hugh Lauder FROM A COMPETETIVE EDUCATION TO THE PROSPERITY OF THE NATION . 16 Yerezhep Mambetkaziyev CAREER PLANNING FOR FUTURE OPPORTUNITIES . 18 Tim Miller PANEL SESSION 1: GLOBAL SKILLS THE PARADOX OF EMERGING UNIVERSITIES . 20 Simon Jones THE ROLE OF TERTIARY EDUCATION IN ADDRESSING THE GLOBAL SKILLS CHALLENGE . 30 Jamil Salmi NURTURING NET GENERATION GRADUATES WITH GLOBAL SKILLS . 36 Seeram Ramakrishna PRACTICE-ORIENTED LEARNING – A PLATFORM FOR THE FORMATION OF GLOBAL SKILLS . 47 Jamilya Nurmanbetova PANEL SESSION 2: PERCEPTIONS OF EMPLOYABILITY PERCEPTIONS OF EMPLOYABILITY, SKILLS AND INDIVIDUAL ASPIRATION IN A DIVERSIFYING ECONOMY . 53 Alan Ruby A PERSPECTIVE ON FUTURE EMPLOYABILITY . 56 Alper Akdeniz DEVELOPMENT OF NATIONAL QUALIFICATION SYSTEM BASED ON EDUCATION SPHERE AND LABOUR MARKET INTERFACE . 61 Arstan Gazaliyev & Yuri Pak UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF FUNDAMENTAL VALUES IN SERVING A LARGER PURPOSE . 67 Aida Sagintayeva 4 PANEL SESSION 3: UNIVERSITY-EMPLOYER-COMMUNITY RELATIONSHIPS CREATING EMPLOYABILITY . 69 Loretta O’Donnell TRANSFORMING TERTIARY EDUCATION FOR INNOVATION AND COMPETITIVENESS: UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL ASIA . 72 Shamsh Kassim-Lakha MAIN DIRECTIONS IN DEVELOPING CORPORATE PARTNERSHIPS: THE CASE OF RUDNY INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE, KAZAKHSTAN . 77 Abdrakhman Naizabekov UNIVERSITY/INDUSTRY PARTNERSHIPS: PROMISING PRACTICES FROM THE FIELD . 79 Matthew Hartley PANEL SESSION 4: ROLE OF TVET IN CAREER DEVELOPMENT TECHNICAL SKILLS: THROUGH LEARNING AND PRACTICE? . 81 Sabyrzhan Madeyev TVET AND CAREER DEVELOPMENT . 85 Geoff Hayward SKILLS, EMPLOYABILITY AND UNIVERSITY GRADUATES? . 90 Rainer Goertz PANEL SESSION 5: STUDENT TRANSITIONS AND CAREERS GUIDANCE TRANSITION FROM SCHOOL TO UNIVERSITY: SOME ISSUES FOR KAZAKHSTAN AND THE WIDER REGION . 92 David Bridges CLOSING SESSION SOVIET LEGACY IN HIGHER EDUCATION: SOME OBSERVATIONS FROM RUSSIA . 95 Isak Froumin PRINCIPAL LEARNING POINTS . 97 Sue Bennett 5 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This collection of papers is the fourth of a series of annual proceedings of the Eurasian Higher Education Leaders’ Forum. This year’s Forum, held on the 11-12 of June, 2015 at Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan has provided an international platform that gathered higher education leaders, policy makers, faculty members and students to discuss issues of graduate employability in the 21st century. The Forum and its consequent proceedings could not have been completed without invaluable contributions of our distinguished speakers and authors. Our presenters come from different professional backgrounds including higher education institutions, national business companies as well as international businesses that work closely with education stakeholders across Kazakhstan, the Central Asia region and beyond. The success of the Forum has been due in no small part to the meticulous work of the members of the Steering Committee that greatly contributed to the development of the themes and the contents of the panel sessions. The key themes of the 2015 Eurasian Higher Education Leaders’ Forum include: • Role of global skills in the graduate employability; • Perceptions of employability, skills and individual aspiration in a diversifying economy; • University-employer-community relationships; • Role of Vocational Education and Training (VET) in career development; • Student transitions and careers guidance. The Forum aimed at developing an international dialogue between higher education leaders, policy makers, researchers and practitioners from different parts of the world. The quality of debate and argument has benefited from the participation of local and international delegates that have shared their expertise, insights and visions on the current situation of graduate employability from local and global perspectives. More than 500 participants from twelve countries took part in the Forum’s sessions and Q&A discussions. We hope that these conference proceedings will serve as a valuable resource for higher education leaders, faculty members and policy makers interested in the issues of employability. We invite everyone who is interested in reflecting on the continuities and changes in education development and taking strategic actions to improve their national and local educational environments. Information about the annual Eurasian Higher Education Leaders’ Forum is available on our website at www.ehelf.nu.edu.kz. This collection of papers is a project of the Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education. Aida Sagintayeva and Kairat Kurakbayev, Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education, Astana, Kazakhstan September 2015 6 CONFERENCE STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBERS CHAIR Shigeo Katsu, President, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan. MEMBERS Rakhman Alshanov, President, Association of Higher Education Institutions of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Kadisha Dairova, Vice President for Student Affairs and International Cooperation, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan. Zakir Jumakulov, Researcher, Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education, Kazakhstan. Jamilya Nurmanbetova, First Vice Rector, Gumilov Eurasian National University, Kazakhstan. Loretta O’Donnell, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan.. Alan Ruby, Senior Fellow, University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, US. Aida Sagintayeva, Chief Executive Director, Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education, Kazakhstan. Janet Turarbekova, Director, Department of Communication and Marketing, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan. Stavros Yiannouka, CEO, World Innovation Summit for Education, Qatar, Doha. 7 CONTRIBUTORS WELCOMING SPEECH Aslan Sarinzhipov is Minister of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan. KEYNOTE SPEECHES Alper Akdeniz is Managing Partner for Eurasia, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Kazakhstan. Geoff Hayward is Head of the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, UK. Shamsh Kassim-Lakha is Executive Chairman of the Board Executive Committee of University of Central Asia (UCA), Kyrgyz Republic. Hugh Lauder is Professor of Education and Political Economy, University of Bath, UK. Jamil Salmi is Global Tertiary Education Expert, Morocco. PAPERS Sue Bennett is Director of Student Careers and Skills, University of Warwick, UK. David Bridges is Director of Research at University of Cambridge Faculty of Education, UK. Isak Froumin is Academic Director of the Institute of Education, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Russia. Arstan Gazaliyev is Rector of Karaganda State Technical University, Kazakhstan. Rainer Goertz is Senior Expert, TVET, GIZ Kazakhstan Honorary Professor of the Economic Research Institute of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Honorary Professor of the Eurasian Economic Club of Scientists, Kazakhstan. Matthew Hartley is Professor and Chair, Higher Education Division, University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, USA. Simon Jones is Provost, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan. Sabyrzhan Madeyev is Director, Department for Modernization of Vocational and Post-secondary Education, Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Yerezhep Mambetkaziyev is President of Kazakh-American Free University, Kazakhstan. Timothy Miller is General Director, Tengizchevroil, Kazakhstan. Abdrakhman Naizabekov is Rector, Rudny Industrial Institute, Kazakhstan. Jamilya Nurmanbetova is First Vice-Rector, Gumilyov Eurasian National University, Kazakhstan. Loretta O’Donnell is Vice-Provost for Academic Affairs, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan. Yury Pak is Acting Vice Rector of Karaganda State Technical University, Kazakhstan. Seeram Ramakrishna is Director, Centre for Nanofibers & Nanotechnology, National University of Singapore, Singapore. Alan Ruby is Senior Research Fellow, University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education, USA. Aida Sagintayeva is Chief Executive Director, Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education, Kazakhstan. 8 Aida Sagintayeva and Kairat Kurakbayev PREFACE Aida Sagintayeva and Kairat Kurakbayev These conference proceedings represent voices of academia, students, employers and labour market on perspectives and issues of graduates’ employability. As the academic world tries to grasp its ways of drawing closer ties of education systems with the real-world labour market, youth unemployment and underemployment has become common across the world especially at times of economic crisis. With 14% of OECD average of youth unemployment (August 2015) and Kazakhstan’s youth unemployment rate of 4.2 % (July, 2015), we are observing more and more debates stressing education policies geared to the labour market and the importance of active labour market policies on both national and international levels. The scene is set in the introductory