Skills for the Future of Work: WYSD’s theme for this year
It was in 2014 that the United Nations (UN) General Assembly declared July 15 as WYSD – with the aim of creating greater awareness regarding the importance of technical, vocational education, and training, especially among youth across the world.
Young people, said United Nations Organization (UNO), are more vulnerable to unemployment than adults, are exposed to labor market inequalities and have to put up with low quality jobs.
In addition, UNO said, women are not only underemployed but also under-paid, often were forced to work under temporary contracts.
An estimated 71 million young people unemployed in 2015, contributing to 13.1 percent youth unemployment rate, which is expected increase in most regions by 2017, according to a recent International Labour Organization (ILO) publication, “Global Employment Trends for Youth 2015”.
Recognizing the need to empower the youth with necessary skills to succeed in their lives and to improve global economy, WorldSkills International – a not for profit agency operating world wide -- recognized WYSD on July 15, 2017, and used #SkillsForAll and #WYSD, to raise awareness on the importance of youth developing skills.
“As the Canadian Member organization to WorldSkills International, Skills/Competences Canada is fortunate to liaise with trade and technology industry experts from around the world. The Skills Movement in Canada will be enhanced through globalized alliances which emphasize the importance and value of these careers to youth. By hosting the WorldSkills Competition in Canada, our youth, educators and industry partners will see firsthand that careers in trades and technology are valued, respected and critical to both economic and social prosperity not only in Canada but in the entire global marketplace,” said Terry Cooke, Official Delegate for Canada.
Attributing structural unemployment -- mismatch between skills offered by workers and skills demanded by employers -- UNO said this is one of the main reasons which affects all regions around the world and impacts economies development.
A lot needs to be done to close this gap -- like changes in education policies and in workers’ rights and protections – but there are a number of resources available for skills development that need to be tapped, five among these being most important, Office of the Secretary General’s Envoy on Youth said.
Codecademy, an interactive online platform offering coding classes -- free of cost -- in 12 different programming languages including Python, Java, PHP, JavaScript, Ruby, SQL, and Sass, and markup languages HTML and CSS.
Memrise, a language learning app which combines memory techniques with entertaining content to make learning fun.
SDG Academy, offers free high-quality content from a global faculty of experts in the field of sustainable development.
Khan Academy provides instructional videos with practice exercises on a personalized learning dashboard – enabling study at participants' own pace -- for subjects like maths, science, computer programming, history, economics, and more.
Coursera, partnering with top universities and organizations, offers global access to online courses in various fields of education.
(Reporting by Asha Bajaj)
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