EUROPEAN EXPERIENCE IN PROMOTING YOUTH EMPLOYMENT

Abstract

The article is devoted to topical issues of promoting the employment of graduates of higher education institutions in Ukraine. The relevance of this topic is due to the fact that young people with higher education after graduation face certain difficulties related to employment in the first workplace. The problems of career guidance, job search, and employment are caused by many factors, including the mismatch of graduates' competencies with the needs of the labor market, insufficient awareness of young people about job search technologies, lack of social skills, insufficient information about opportunities to gain professional experience, and others. It has been established that the problem of employment of graduates of higher educational institutions has a pan-European character. In Ukraine, the mentioned problem is even more acute, as it is complicated by the challenges of martial law. The article highlights the best practices of EU countries, which are used to support young people in the transition from education to work. In particular, the experience of France, Slovenia, Italy, Austria, Denmark, Belgium, Finland, Croatia and others was studied. Their common features are singled out and summarized, in particular, the program method, complexity and flexibility combined with individualization of services, broad partnership, co-financing, etc. Based on the generalization of the progressive European experience, the main directions of activation of measures to improve the employment of young people with higher education and their consolidation in the domestic labor market are outlined. One of the urgent directions for improving employment in Ukraine should be the development of comprehensive state and regional programs to support the transition of youth from education to the labor market. An important role in this connection is assigned to higher educational institutions, since the competitiveness of specialists depends in many respects on their balanced interaction with the labor market, the compliance of their competences with the modern requirements of employers, and therefore, their rapid transition from education to the labor market.