RISULTATI RICERCA

The characteristics and research targets of the Osservatorio Istud The essay presents characteristics and research targets of the Osservatorio Istud on high qualified young labour; it investigates the theme of the matching between the enterprise demand and the high qualified young labour supply; it debates the results of the first two years of research, that had analysed the ways of transition to job of young graduated, theirs expectations and their job perceptions; the mining given to the job, to the inherent quality of it. Specific attention is dedicated to the theme of work flexibility. Moreover the essays shows the existing link between the job quality and the life quality and the needing of young people self-fulfilment.

The work quality of graduates. Survey taken one and three years after graduation This essay analyses the quality (in sociological terms) of work performed by university graduates one and three years after graduation. In addition to a concise theoretical and interpretive overview on consolidated approaches of sociology and of sustained paradigms regarding transformations in labour and its organisation at a productive level, the results of the AlmaLaurea study are outlined according to a series of factors: work contracts; earning expectations; career expectations; expectations of acquisition of professionalism; autonomy at and in the job; and free time. The results are also evaluated in light of the effectiveness of skills acquired at the university. Lastly, the points of reference which emerge as a consequence are compared to the aforementioned theoretical and interpretive considerations in order to extract elements which can be generalised and thus arrive at a more thorough understanding of the topic.

At work and towords work: propensions, expectations and reality This essay sets out to analyse how employment expectations, expressed by graduates at the moment they received their university degree, are realised and/or modified one and three years after graduation. In particular, the analysis concerns the realisation at work of the propensities expressed at graduation for those who were working; on the other hand, for those who stated that they were jobseekers, the possible changes in their work preferences were examined. In order to determine their principal tendencies, the various aspects of the work which was found or sought were then compared with what was declared at the moment of graduation as well as with appropriate in-depth analyses concerning, for example, gender differences and differences in fields of study and residence.

The employment condition of the graduates: a comparison between graduates, one and three years after graduation This paper examines the trajectories of graduates in the labour market, based on interviews with them one and three years after their graduation. Various aspects are examined thoroughly: the current general situation of graduates; the relationship between the field of studies and the current job; the link between family origins and labour market performances; the trajectories of unemployed graduates; the association between the type of studies and the quality of the current employment situation, its stability, its sector and, more generally, the effectiveness of the path of studies in terms of employment conditions. The possibility of comparing conditions, one and three years after graduation, provides a solid basis for analysis.

Labour orienting and occupability: a theoretical-sociological frame Vocational guidance and occupability theme is faced initially through a contextualization inside transformations now acting in the labour world: changings inside production systems, changings in services, market, labour policies, organization, concepts and culture. Talking about labour orienting and occupability means referring to working people as well as people preparing to enter labour world or unemployed people. In this contribute they dedicate a particular and specific attention to young people, starting from a reflection about the characteristics of the relation between young people and work and about the meanings they give it. After this, they evidence some main aspects of the occupability concept, underling mostly the complexity of this concept, to confront, also from an operative point of view, through a multidimensional approach. Occupability dimensions, through which the concept can be developed under a theoretic profile and read in operative terms, with a particular attention to the inclusion and keeping into labour word of young people, could be considered in a sociological perspective of investigation of the relationship between individual and society. Finally, they underline some strategies and routes that could favour occupability that are not alternative ones but can be developed in an integrated form.

Graduate people and their social context of origin This contribute concerns the existing relationship between social context of origin of graduate people and some of their choices. In particular, in the first part they illustrate the most important elements of the interpretative frame, explaining, under the conceptual profile, the main components of the social context of origin: they suppose that in this occasion the living contest and the original family could be considered particularly relevant. They also formulate some considerations on the relation existing between social context, stratification and social mobility. In the second part they consider available data referring to the geographic area of origin and on socio-economic and cultural characteristics of the family of origin. More, informations about parents profession and their educational qualifications allow the definition of social class indicator. Finally, variables describing objectively the characteristics of the family of origin of graduate people are used to suppose the possible relationship between social context of origin and some choices and behavioural dimensions like the specific curriculum, abroad studies experiences, success in studies, job experience during studying period and geographic mobility for studies.

University students: expectations about study and work In this paper the authors analyze desires and aspirations about studies and work expressed by graduates in the AlmaLaurea questionnaire at the moment of their university degree. Here are examined privileged choices of graduates who want to continue their studies and the expectations about their future employment. Such elements are investigated through the outcomes of questionnaires compiled by students who got their degree in 2001 at the Universities belonging to AlmaLaurea Consortium. Significative meanings analysed together with trends arisen comparing previous identical surveys made during the period 1998- 2001. Post graduate kind of study privileged by graduates who want to keep on studying, job prospectives outlined by job searchers and opinions about most effective job hunting strategies are the topics of this section.

University studies, work during the studies and attendance The authors analyse five factors relating to students during their university studies: work during the studies, class attendance, study abroad, participation in training or internships as foreseen by the study programme, and the amount of time needed to research and write up the graduate thesis. The reference population, students who graduated in 2001, were not affected by the Italian University Reform launched at the end of 1999 (Decree 509/99). The survey shows that each of the above factors takes on a quite dissimilar significance, depending on the graduates’ disciplinary grouping. The range extends from those areas of study in which working during studying is quite frequent (teaching profession and political-social group) to those in which it represents the exception (medical group); from those areas in which students tend to attend every class (medical, scientific and engineering group) to others in which few students attend regularly (legal studies group). There are some disciplines in which study abroad is very common (linguistic group) or fairly common (political-social group), and others where it is rarely taken up (medical and teaching profession group). In certain cases these differences expose shortcomings or difficulties from which the didactic structures of the university suffer. Will the newly set up University Reform be able to contribute to overcoming them?

AlmaLaurea into the Italian university system Born in a narrow basement of the University of Bologna, the AlmaLaurea project has made a name for itself over the course of its first 10 years of activity as a highly qualified component of the entire Italian university system. It aims at monitoring the quality of the formative processes of graduates as well as their occupational condition and at facilitating the intersection between demand and supply of qualified labour. The institutionalisation as an inter-university consortium and the growing voluntary membership of an ever more substantial number of universities (36 universities, with 410,000 curricula vitae stored in a databank) has rendered AlmaLaurea a nearly indispensable point of reference for the universities’ governing bodies, for analysts, students, teachers, and for businesses seeking qualified personnel. AlmaLaurea’s uniqueness lies in having created an integrated system capable of guaranteeing documentation which is complete (universities are accepted into the Consortium on condition that they make available information on their entire student body), periodic (the surveys are taken at regular intervals), well-timed (year after year, a ‘snapshot’ of the universities’ internal and external performances may be obtained) and updatable (the databank is ‘living’ to the extent that the curricula vitae are updated by the graduates themselves and therefore keep up with the graduates’ professional pursuits). All of these factors are made possible by the extended use of information technologies, both for managing the graduate databank and for disseminating its services via the Internet.