Education: career paths
March 16th, 2012 § Leave a Comment
There is a significant gap between the employers and the newly trained specialists finishing their University studying. There was a publication by the leading HR companies like Manpower and Jobtiger, where was stated the problem of not finding skilled professionals in some fields. Surely, there are a lot of reasons for that, but one of them is the lack of clear career paths in Bulgaria. Most of young people in schools and universities are struggling to decide what to do with their lives because of the lack of information and also, are struggling to find job in their professional field simply because the employers are looking for different skills.
This is another topic, which concerns the educational process in Bulgaria. Many of the young students share the opinion that there is need of a national career path centre, where you can find information about the professional high-schools and universities and what they offer and also get information what skills are employers looking for right now (and what are the trends for the upcoming 5-10 years). Such information is hard to find and very often youngsters are not aware of the sources. What is worse – most of their decisions are being made based on assumptions and gossip.
Salaries are an important factor for the decision-making process. Some very important fields are really low-paid and the young people who want to develop those skills are getting fewer (like teachers, doctors etc.). If there are good professionals, they often decide to work abroad and leave the country for good.
The needed functionality of a good career path centre is pretty clear:
+ Starting with your high-school development, if the kid is skillful and loves a certain field even on 13-15, you can send him/her to a professional high-school;
+ If yet not clear about the future development (which is normal), just providing more info about the professions and the skills needed to develop;
+ Give info about good matches between schools and universities;
+ Give info about the skills needed and where is best to develop them;
+ Give info about the potential employers and fields of work, locations etc.;
+ Have a good internship programs info and provide to students in high-school and university.
Education: moodle and other platforms in BG universities
March 8th, 2012 § Leave a Comment
Online tools and systems in universities are a common practice all over the world, but our recent research found that it is not the case in Bulgarian biggest universities. A research with students from some of the most wanted universities like Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, Medical University Sofia, Technical University Sofia, Shumen University “Konstantin Preslavski”, New Bulgarian University, University of National and World Economy Sofia and the National Academy for theatre and film arts showed surprisingly bad results when it comes to an online system like moodle.
Starting with the simple question if the university is having an online system for administration, registration, payment, learning resources etc.; it seems that only few of them are having such, but fewer even use the tools.
New Bulgarian University is having an online systems and when entering in two different panels, the student is able to register and pay (if having online banking on his/her own); to see the timetable; to get access to the learning materials and keep an eye on every lecture online. The tool give more opportunities like blog and discussion boards, but students and professors don’t really use them. However, this is the best case, but you need pay at least 1,200 EUR per year to study in New Bulgarian University, which is probably the highest fee for studying in Bulgarian university.
It seems that the other universities are not having a general platform and the different departments handle the problem on their own (probably, because they are quite autonomous). Some of the students in one university are having different information, which also proves that there is no sufficient informative system integrated.
Some programs in Technical University of Sofia are using online platform for tests and receiving marks. Actually, it is quite strange the university of computer specialists and engineers not have a good online platform. Other students claim not to be having any online tool and all agree it is quite important.
There are departments in Sofia University which are two steps ahead of the others. The Computer Science department is having a moodle, but the students think that professors are afraid to upload and share lectures and articles, feared someone will steal their works… This is a common belief in Sofia University: the professors are not approving Internet’s usage for sharing materials, lectures, because it literally takes their earnings. Their salaries are so low that they are forced to work at several universities and to sell books in order to cover their basic needs.
Sofia’s Medical University, Sumen University and National Academy for theatre and film arts are not having online systems at all.
Today’s students are 100% confident about the need of online tools which can help a lot in their learning. The basic functionality should cover administration, registration and online resources. If we want to go deeper and be more modern: it should have a social element like blogging, discussion boards and gamification elements. The students should use such platform to create communities and exchange information. Bulgarian students are using social networks like facebook and their functionality to create groups where sharing latest news about their studying.
Most of the student find as a very serious problem the fact that professors are not trained to use Internet at all. What is worse, a lot of them are not approving it, or just do not want to go deeper in it.
In the research surveys, students stress on another serious problem: the online presence of their universities (or actually the lack of it). Most of the universities are having a very old (and old-fashioned) websites, which look amateur and don’t even have an English version. They also think that those institutions should have a very active presence in the online field including social networks, informative and science portals. It is true that such online activity can increase the awareness of the institution and also to increase the approval, interest by the future and current students.
So, the future of the online presence of Bulgarian universities is quite clear:
+ They should 100% have an online platform for administration, registrations and learning courses.
+ They should take the example of social networks and understand that Internet is not a virtual reality, but the reality itself. And to integrate it within their platforms.
+ They should be active online; professors should use the Internet for creating their online reputation.
+ They should teach the students how to improve their selves, but also should learn from them. Right now, that is definitely the case!
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Music: why using amazon for buying BG music?
February 26th, 2012 § Leave a Comment
Because it is the only option.. At least I couldn’t find another. Another thing, many people don’t buy, but simply download it from a torrent website, because too often it is too complicated or impossible to find what you are looking for in online stores.
I have a very fresh case here. A bulgarian band just introduced their latest project and I went to the Internet do buy it. My journey started with their website. I was happy to see a tab “Shop” on their website and clicked. Unfortunately, their latest single and album are not there. Then I went to a bulgarian online store called Store.bg. Well, there was nothing there (only one album). I’ve noticed another problem: there were only CDs to order online (well, I don’t have a CD on my laptop, so this is not an option to me).
It seems that I need to go worldwide… I’ve checked iTunes for the single or album. Much better! I found most of the band’s albums and singles. Anyways, if I don’t want to use apple’s products I need to find another place. Of course, amazon is a very good option. Another thing, there is a mp3 download option (finally!). Unfortunately, I found only three of the band’s albums.
I find a huge gap here. All of the bulgarian music stores are quite useless nowadays. Another thing, the bands and artists may earn more if simply provide their fans with a possibility to buy their music easy and fast.
Education in BG: English is a must; third language is important; 4th is a plus
February 16th, 2012 § Leave a Comment
Here comes another topic about education: the way kids learn new languages now. Well, I am sure it is quite different from the time I did (simply because we didn’t have youtube, Wikipedia and online dictionaries at that time), but I know how it is in my little niece’s kindergarten.
She comes at home and tells her mom a word, which she thinks means “red”. But it does not. Then her mom says: “It is red, not @#$%”. “I know, mom. But the other kids say it this way and if I do differently, they will laugh at me”. And she is 4.
Of course this will change in time, mostly because she will grow up in front of the computer and will see the right word a billion times. But it is good if we can keep an eye of the way kids learn languages and if we can help by introducing the best sources to do that.
What I mean here is creating a platform for Bulgarian schools, where kids can learn new languages together (even if they are in different schools). And if we want to go deeper – we can connect it with native speakers, kids from all over the world.
A good example of such platform is LiveMocha. It is a place where everyone can learn another language by going through many lessons and his/her notes and submissions can be checked by native speakers. What about such thing in school?
It would look like a moodle, but designed especially for instant learning and real-time exercises. It would be much more suitable to make kids create their homework on the PC and submit it online. This way the school can recruit native teachers, who can help kids learn from distance and won’t need to come to Bulgaria for teaching.
I am not aware if such platform exists in any school in Bulgaria. I know where it doesn’t – where I’ve learned English, German and French. I am looking for stories to prove the other way about. Still, I believe, here is still a gap and can open many job positions. :-)
Education in Bulgaria: Gamification
February 13th, 2012 § 4 Comments
There is no doubt about that: video games saved several generations of Bulgarian youngsters from the inborn and enforced earnestness in their early years. This typically Bulgarian skill is defined by Steve Keil (american enterpreneur) as a “baba factor” (baba in bulgarian means grandmother). Basically meaning that kids are often taken care of by their grandmothers who make them (unconsciously) believe they are not good enough to do anything big with their lives.
What is worse, this is being continuously assimilated in school by very serious and boring books; not permitting the children to laugh and feel happy in class etc. A main problem at school are the old-fashioned ways of teaching, the old books, bad conditions and environment and also not having any access to modern facilities (due to schools being poor).
There are several ways those quite significant problems to be solved:
- To motivate the young students: to create a willing to try new things, to make them comprehend why that is so important for their future.
- To increase interest in the subject: by making it look like a game (especially for younger students).
- To give them access to computers and multimedia: poorer schools can take part in different European projects and teachers/professors can start such projects to gain funds for facilities in school.
Motivation and interest can be increased with gamification. By making the students feel like real characters in a video game, they can feel excited when reaching certain levels in their assignment.
The idea of gamification is quite simple:
Firstly, at the beginning of the term, the teacher defines the goals of this term (or school year) and what level should be reached (well-known mark). Every student has to increase the skill points (on every skill) in order to reach the desired level.
Then come the armory and weaponry to help them increase those skills. Armory includes the main sources of knowledge the kids need to use. Every armor unit can be relevant to one or more skills and can help them in a different way. Weaponry is the extra stuff to help them create their assignments or to use the skills – MS office can help you write your essay or answer the test in a google doc.
Of course, gamification can include different skills; every category could be called anyhow. It doesn’t matter. What matters is the kids to start using all the tools Internet and computers give them for preparing great stuff, learning and getting ready for the real life.
Do you love this idea? Then why not working as Game Designer for school projects? Does this sound to you as a job of the future?
You can check our friends’(GameCraft) UMMO game description for more detailed picture of such scheme.
did you meet the future of BG?
February 13th, 2012 § Leave a Comment
Did you look around then? That was the future of Bulgaria: all those young people who are afraid of someone taking their freedom on Internet.
Bulgarian youth clearly showed where their sacred territory is. Protests should be made against many problems in Bulgaria, but actually this is what unlocked their hidden anger. So called “children of the transition” (the transition between communism and democracy in the early 90s) grew up in front of the first computers and met Internet for the first time while being teenagers. Now those kids are called generations Y and Z, showing that the technology and internet are changing everything: lifestyle, way of work and business models.
This is what is opening new doors for Bulgarian youth. Many gaps need to be filled (e.g. we don’t have e-government) and Internet is giving plenty of opportunities for those young people. Basically, whatever you do well now, will make you innovative, interesting and successful. You just need to feel a gap. But should do it now.
Start up an e-Bulgaria is just about that: showing those opportunities and explaining how e-skills can make you do whatever you’d like to.
