As part of the Education for Employment Project in BiH, the third and fourth meetings of the Higher Education Working Group (WG) were held in Brčko from March 30th until April 1st. Zoran Bulatović, the Head of the Education Department in the Government of the Brcko District, personally welcomed the members of this WG, while supporting and emphasizing the importance of their work.
The main theme of the third meeting was to examine the labour market needs for higher education qualifications. Based on the example of the Canton of Sarajevo, the project team presented the results of the Labour Market Needs Assessment (LMNA) that at the moment refers to the Federation of BiH.
Following this example, the WG members in a practical workshop defined in detail the higher education qualifications required in the current labour market. It was decided that, at the next meeting, this WG would elaborate the same topics in relation to Republika Srpska (RS) and Brčko District. It was also agreed that the project team will organize a special workshop with the Agency for Development of Higher Education and Quality Assurance of BiH and the Agency for Higher Education of RS, in order to train their analysts to perform such studies independently. Five qualifications and ten occupational standards, which will be developed during the course of the project, were also defined as a result of this workshop.
The topic of the fourth meeting of the Higher Education WG was the recognition of non-formal education and informal learning (RPL). The WG was presented with the examples of rule books, application forms and requests for the recognition of non-formal education and informal learning. The Working Group concluded that once the Rulebook for the Recognition of Non-Formal Education and Informal Learning is legally formulated in BiH, it will be used in the future development of the RPL system. Also, in May 2022, the Project will organize a large round table discussion with the participation of all universities in the country.
Members of the WG for Higher Education come from a variety of institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, including the Ministry of Civil Affairs of BiH, the competent education authorities in BiH, the Centre for Information and Recognition of Documents in Higher Education, the Agency for Higher Education Development and Quality Assurance of BiH, and the Agency for Higher Education of RS.
In order to overcome the high unemployment rate and a huge mismatch of the education and training systems with the demands of the labour market, the EU funded project “Education for Employment, BiH” aims to produce human resources in line with the labour market needs in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The project assists BiH authorities in improving capacity and structure for planning the educational process and quality of educational outcomes.
