Online training for placement officers organized by the University of Siena

The staff of Jiangnan University attended the first session of the online training for placement officers, which took place on December 21, 2020.

The training was opened by Prof. Maurizio Pompella, academic coordinator of the JEUL project, who presented the experience of the Department of Business and Law of the University of Siena in organizing the internships for students. Mario De Martino, project officer of the project, and Lorenzo Costantino, trainer at IHF underlined how the Erasmus placement offers interesting opportunities for placement in international contexts for students.

Barbora Bukovanová, international coordinator at ŠKODA AUTO University, presented the internship scheme at her institution. She explained how Skoda Auto University organizes mandatory internships, optional professional internships and the system of bachelor’s theses at the university.

Prof. Iraj Hashi, the external evaluator of the JEUL project, presented the quality assurance aspects related to the upgrade of the placement offices at the partner universities focusing on the collaboration with enterprises. Signing memoranda of understanding with companies is crucial to ensure the placement of students, staff for case studies and for the establishment of the university-enterprise committee.

Lorenzo Costantino, trainer of IHF, presented the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on placement offices activities and described the stakeholder survey, which will be launched by IHF in early 2021. The questionnaire elaborated by IHF aims at assessing how placement offices of universities located both in Europe and Asia responded to the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic. The data of the survey will be collected and analysed by IHF in a report.