BY: Michelle Liew
The past year has been undeniably difficult for those in employment but fresh graduates have been put through the wringer.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, employment opportunities have become scarce and graduates have delved into areas beyond their studied courses in order to survive.
In an effort to increase the marketability of graduates in Malaysia, the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) has launched various initiatives to aid those in need.
One of such initiatives is the Graduates Reference Hub for Employment and Training (GREaT). The portal was launched in September 2020, making it easier for graduates to find out more about job offers as well as other opportunities and programmes.
The portal also explores opportunities to further studies, application for study-sponsorship, entrepreneurship programmes and skills improvement trainings.
According to the 2020 Graduate Tracking Study conducted by the MOHE, marketability rate of graduates decreased by 1.8%. In 2020, the study found that Malaysian graduates had a marketability rate of 84.4%, compared to 86.2% in the previous year. To put things into perspective, a total of 40,550 respondents did not manage to find a job within six months after graduating.
As such, the ministry’s introduction of JobMatching@GREaT module that matches unemployed graduates with suitable job vacancies found in their database. You could potentially get a job offer without even having to apply for one. The Graduate Tracking Survey System (SKPG) database will identify graduates who have not yet found a job. It will then match these graduates with the suitable vacancies in suitable companies or industries.
MOHE hopes that the initiative will help to increase the marketability of local graduates, thereby contributing to the economic development of the country.
