Belgrade Open School organised conference „Internships as a bridge between education and labour market“ on 23rd of February 2016, in the premises of Palace of Serbia in Belgrade.

The results of the project „PRAKSAM - Introducing youth to the world of work through internship placements“ were presented at the conference. Through this project, 30 young people had the opportunity to gain working experience in 18 companies. One-third of the young people who participated in this project obtained a job.

„Quality internships are one of the most efficient mechanisms for improvement of youth employability and employment. This project is a part of the wider initiative of Belgrade Open School for improving the employability of young people“ said Vesna Djukic, the general director of Belgrade Open School in her opening remarks.

Assistant minister of the Ministry of Youth and Sports, Snezana Klasnja, emphasised the importance of these initiatives and the readiness of the Ministry to provide support to similar activities since the one of the priorities of Ministry of Youth and Sports is to increase the employment of young people and to support active participation of young people in society. The problems in the transition of young people from education to employment are directly associated with high youth unemployment rate. Although at the moment there are various quality internship programmes, the absence of systematic approach to tackling this problem is deepening the existing problem of unemployment“.

More than 60% of young people younger than 30 who are registered with the National Employment Service, do not have working experience. In order to provide a solution, National Employment Service has been organising internships and other programmes for gaining working experience in cooperation with employers from public and private sector“, explained Zoran Martinovic, the director of National Employment Service.

Mirjana Kovacevic, the director of the Education centre in the Chamber of Commerce, said that the human resource development is one of the main goals of the Chamber of Commerce. Employers in Serbia often face the challenge of finding the candidates for certain positions due to the lack of practical skills of future employees. Since only 38% of employers participates in the organization of internship programmes, Mirjana Kovacic believes that the one of the possible reasons is the absence of a regulatory framework for internship organisation.

A main conclusion of the conference was that it is of immense importance to establish a system on a national level which will encourage employers to organize quality internship programmes and secure rights of young people who participate in these programmes.

The project "PRAKSAM – Introducing youth to the world of work through internship placements“ Belgrade Open School is Implementing in partnership with Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Serbia and with the financial support of the Ministy of Youth and Sports.