SKILLS REQUIRED BY COMPANIES FROM FOREST ENGINEERS. EXPERIENCES FROM THE UNIVERSITY - ALUMNI - COMPANY RELATION AT THE UNIVERSITY OF EXTREMADURA

The Bologne process have implied significant changes in the Spanish Universities. With these changes, new learning techniques, new formation possibilities, more student mobility and more skills in students are required, and therefore, a suitable academic and professional orientation must be provided.

To this aim, since 2007 the Forest Science faculty of the University of Extremadura has developed several experiences related to the interaction between professors, students, alumni and companies. With these experiences, the main goal was to improve the skills acquired by students in order to facilitate their professional integration. In April 2014 a workshop was conducted at the University Center of Plasencia, in order to allow the faculty and alumni from the Degree of Forestry and Environmental Engineering know the skills required by companies.
Different topics were developed in this workshop for providing a global knowledge to attendants. In particular, sessions related to national and international mobility, international job possibilities, jobs developed by forest companies in Extremadura or a meeting of students belonging to the recently created Old Alumni Association of Forest Engineers from the University of Extremadura (AAAIFUEX) and current students, among others, were developed in this workshop.

The most interesting sessions were those dedicated to the forest companies and AAAIFUEX. In addition, a survey was conducted to know the impressions obtained by attendants with this workshop, in a similar way as it was done in other experiences conducted in previous years. Therefore, the aim of this work is to show the results obtained from these surveys in this workshop. In addition, the main deficiencies and the strengths detected by alumni graduated at the University Center of Plasencia, in the degree of Forestry and Environmental of the University of Extremadura will be exposed. Results showed that alumni and students consider that it is very important to promote this type of workshops with the presence of professionals from different companies. In addition, the workshop allowed both, the students and the faculty staff, to know the main deficiencies in the curriculum development and showed the possibilities the alumni have in order to strength them and also pointed out the skills the professor must work on during the formation process of the students in order to facilitate their employment.