Novi Sad, October 20 2011 – International conference “Building Bridges – Connecting Enterprise and Education” was held at the University of Novi Sad on Thursday, October 20. It is a final conference within the three-year TEMPUS project “HELP” which gathered project partners from Serbia, Croatia, Hungary, Romania and United Kingdom. The Conference was officially opened by the rector of the University of Novi Sad professor Miroslav Vesković. The working sessions included the presentation of the project results as well as its contribution to the development and strenghtening of partnerships between universities, on one side, and companies, SMEs, banks and other organizations and enterprises, on the other.
Main goal of the project “Higher Education Learning Partnerships – HELP” is to establish basis for building learning partnerships between higher education and enterprise sectors. These partnerships are intended to define and secure the continuous learning process for the employees to gain new skills, as an adequate answer to the changing needs of dynamic markets and goals of economic and social development in Central and Eastern Europe. The main purpose of the “HELP” project is to raise awareness about the importance of training for the success of the businesses.
The project also included the research on training needs which was carried out in Croatia, Hungary, Romania and Serbia, for the main purpose to assess the current situation in the region. Furthermore, the aim was to determine the ways of collaboration between universities and enterprises in the field of identifying specific skills and building training programmes.
The project participants from Serbia are the University of Novi Sad – UNESCO Chair for Entrepreneurial Studies, Carlsberg Serbia and the Centre for Strategic Economic Studies “Vojvodina CESS”. The project coordinator is professor Fuada Stanković, former rector of the University of Novi Sad and the first head of the UNESCO Chair.
The project has been supported through the EU TEMPUS programme. The results include 16 trainings, four in each partner country – Serbia, Hungary, Romania and Croatia. The trainings organized at the University of Novi Sad from April 2011 are the following: “How to create market for your own innovation?”; “How to Prepare for Business Life?”; “How to Improve Own Sales/Presentation/Negotiating Skills?”; “Formulating the Strategy for Innovative Business”. These trainings are provided for students and company employees in different business sectors. Due to the project funding, these trainings are organized free of charge in the first year of their realization. The groups include 15 to 25 participants.
Beside the training programmes, new partnerships between the participating universities and local companies have been established in every country. The UNESCO Chair for Entrepreneurial Studies at the University of Novi Sad established cooperation with over 20 different companies, SMEs and other organizations in different business fields, from education, production, IT and design, to banking, marketing and retail. Apart from that, the project initiated the introduction of the One Stop Shop concept at the University, which should represent a unique point of contact for all the companies and other organizations in need for specialized employee trainings, research studies or other specialized services which can be provided by the University.
Beside project results and experiences gained in Serbia, Hungary, Romania, Croatia and the United Kingdom, the conference will present the project publication “Partnership Working in Central and Eastern Europe: Experience of the HELP project 2009-2012”. This publication offers insight into the experiences gained through the HELP project during the three-year period. In the context of “learning partnerships”, this publication underlines the innovated role of universities: to understand how the requirements for specialized skills change in companies and to provide adequate answers, as well as to modify the process and content of teaching and learning. New partnerships between universities and enterprises should be built on the foundation of common interest to contribute to economic and social development through continuous learning, cooperation and innovation.
Programme of the Conference
Additional information:
UNESCO Chair for Entrepreneurial Studies
TEPMPUS “HELP” project
One Stop Shop Initiative
