Students and job seekers or career changers in Egypt are looking to move towards science, technology, engineering, and math, or in other words, (STEM)-related jobs in various industries. They are all looking for an increase in job opportunities in these fields over the next ten years.
The vast majority of job seekers, especially in Egypt, are familiar with online training courses. Those with digital qualifications and/or certificates agree that they have helped them achieve their professional goals, but the cost is large and comes as a priority for almost all groups.
The global study by IBM, commissioned by Morning Consult, was based on local findings from more than 14,000 interviews with students, jobseekers and people looking to change jobs. In Egypt, representatives of the three groups participated in online interviews, and the statistical data of a sample of target groups of people were measured according to age, gender, and educational level.
Marwa Abbas, General Manager of IBM Egypt, says: “The labor market is witnessing a qualitative transformation as a result of the continuous revolution and the changes that accompany digitization in various industries. Therefore, new generations must pay attention to learning, exploring their interests, and acquiring skills to qualify for future jobs. Science and technology play a major role in achieving success stories by fostering innovation with passion. We are committed to working with our partners through the IBM SkillsBuild platform to offer many learning paths for those who want to work in technology, especially among underrepresented groups.”
IBM has announced that it is working with 45 new educational partners around the globe with the goal of making science, technology, engineering and mathematics available to groups that have not previously participated enough in this field. These partnerships work with social service, economic and professional development organizations as well as government agencies and universities to make courses available online, using the IBM SkillsBuild platform, as well as defining clear pathways to employment. Many of these organizations focus on providing skills to specific communities including women and mothers returning to work, as well as minorities and low-income people, and refugees.
The IBM and Morning Consult study revealed the perceptions of student, career-changing, and career-seeking participants in STEM fields.
For STEM training, participants in Egypt are confident that online training and digital course completion certificates can help them achieve their goals. Ninety percent of the participants who obtained a digital certificate in the training courses agree that it helped them achieve their professional goals.
Ninety percent of participants feel confident in their ability to develop their skills, or learn something new from a digital platform, in addition to knowing how to find information on topics they are interested in online.
Considering the cost as the most important factor when thinking about developing the skills of job seekers and obtaining digital qualifications, they take into account whether the program is a self-learning system and if it has a specific period of time.
A third of the participants plan to obtain digital qualifications to improve their skills in the fields in which they currently work. Respondents are generally unsure about careers related to STEM majors although they consider software developers to be a career in a STEM field.
Sixty-three percent of job seekers in Egypt reported that they are aware of jobs related to STEM fields, but more than half of the students and those who want to change their profession said that they are not aware of it.
Sixty percent of job seekers and sixty two percent of those seeking to change their profession are interested in working in STEM jobs.
Respondents are optimistic that STEM jobs will increase across various sectors in the future.
Eighty percent of students, eighty four percent of those who want to change careers, and ninety-one percent of job seekers in Egypt expect more STEM job opportunities in the next 10 years.
IBM supports people who want to learn, helping them correct misconceptions about technology and the STEM careers of the future by adopting a comprehensive approach to investing in their future careers. The IBM SkillsBuild platform offers free online training to learners around the world, with attention to groups that are not sufficiently engaged in technology, working with local partners, experts to enrich the course content through project-based learning, connecting learners with real job opportunities. To that end, the company announced 45 new collaborations to expand the availability of the IBM SkillsBuild platform worldwide.
IBM, working with its partners, continues its commitment to upskilling 30 million people worldwide by 2030.
