Abstract:

In the process of evaluation of the quality and improvement of the learning-teaching process is necessary to make use of the information on the expected competence of employees and the trend of the various areas of the economy and therefore also anticipation of demand for specific qualified employees. From the point of view of the university are crucial not only information directly derived from employers but also from people that have completed offered courses of study. The reason is the opportunity to gain an opinion on how graduates deal on the labour market and the suitability of qualifications obtained in the process of higher education in professional life. The use of this information should enable an assessment to match offered study programs to the needs of the economy and employers.

This article presents the experience and research results of the Lublin University of Technology devoted to the graduates' professional fate. Acquisition of information from persons who have completed education is one of the elements of a comprehensive system for collecting data on the learning-teaching process from external stakeholders (graduates, employers) and internal ones (students, employees). Their analysis is a source of the overall evaluation of the quality of the learning-teaching process carried out at the university. This assessment is used to carry out the cyclical analyzes of study programs offered by various organizational units of the university, including effects and learning-teaching content, in terms of their compliance with the expectations of the labour market. The basic information obtained from studies conducted in 2014-2016 on how graduates deals on the labour market, ie about having (or not having) employment, the period of searching for a job or profession, allowed an overall assessment of the level of adaptation of the learning-teaching process to the expectations of labour market and employers, which was one of the criteria for quality assessment. In turn, data on the factors affecting the acquisition and retention of work, as well as the use of the qualification gained during the qualification studies, have allowed a more detailed assessment of the learning-teaching process and programs. It resulted in the design and implementation of changes for some fields of study, in order to improve the level of matching programs to the expectations of the labour market. The results of the research on the graduates' forms of further training were used to review and extend the offer of postgraduate studies and training.

Keywords:

Studies on the professional fate of university graduates, management of higher education, quality of higher education.