ADDIS ABABA — The 70/30 student placement ratio in natural and social science studies has been changed to 55/45 so as to run into universities’ acceptance capacity and satisfy students’ interest to join their fields of study, according to the Ministry of Science and Higher Education.
In an exclusive interview with The Ethiopian Herald, Dechasa Gurmu, Public Relation Director at the Ministry, said that previously, the government has been implementing a student placement ratio that assigns 70 percent of students into natural science fields with the remaining 30 percent joining social science fields.
Now, the government has changed
its placement mechanism based on universities’ acceptance capacity and
students’ interest to join different fields of study. Currently, about 142,900
students are attending higher education at different public universities.
Afterwards, starting from the current academic year, the 55/45 per cent placement ratio will be applied in natural and social science fields respectively, he added. Students in the current academic year will be placed more or less based on their interest, Dechasa explained.
He further said that the placement has also direct implication for job creation. Previously, there was serious problem to create job opportunity for graduate students particularly from natural science fields.
As to him, this opportunity will enable students to attend their fields of interest attentively and finally will help them find and create jobs in their interest. Additionally, more than 200 private schools are also providing social science fields than that of natural, he stated.
Dechassa also said cognizant of the fact that the number of service providers at social science fields are greater than that of natural science, this placement is important for students to get ample employment opportunities after graduation.
Meeting the market demand is not the only reason to change the placement policy, it was also important to consider universities’ acceptance capacity, the country’s man power demand, and other issues, Dechasa added.
Befikadu Belay, Quality Assurance Head at Pretor Business College told The Ethiopian Herald that the previous ratio was difficult to match graduates with jobs. There was incompatibility among the graduate students and the market demand available in the country, he added.
But for him, the flexibility of student’s placement policy is vital particularly for reducing unemployment of graduate students coupled with increasing education quality across the nation. Apart from its psychological advantage, education is tremendously important for economic growth.
Therefore students are likely to follow their education with due commitment just to get both psychological and economic satisfaction, Befikadu stated.
The Ethiopian Herald, December 28/2019
BY HIZKEL HAILU
