For two years now, RisiAlbania cooperates with University Aleksandër Moisiu Durres, Agriculture University of Tirana and Luarasi University, to develop their career services and to introduce a model that can be easily replicated by other universities.

In this unprecedented situation of physical distancing due to COVID-19, education system as other sectors were widely challenged. Nevertheless, the academic year 2019-2020 found our partner universities with a new and improved career service in place. With the support of RisiAlbania, each respective staff is certified through the international standard Global Career Development Facilitator and has had a proactive role in career development of their students. While there is still a lot of challenges, this pandemic found the career centers and their staff better equipped to adopt to this difficult situation.

Despite physical distancing, career offices of these universities have successfully organized at monthly career webinars, with participation of 50 to 100 students. The purpose of these series of webinars is to support students develop their career portfolios and better prepare to transition to the labour market. Each time, students showed great interest in the topics through highly interacting with the career counsellors and through follow up. In most cases, students were offered the possibility to reflect on the gained knowledge and apply it in preparing and updating their CVs and letters of motivation. Career counsellors have further followed up by reviewing and providing one-to-one guidance when needed.

During this time, another important tool was made available to students and career staff alike. The Career Manual for students is an exploration career tool for independent use by university level youth, based on best European practices and strongly rooted in each university context. The work that had already started in the beginning of the year, with the support of RisiAlbania, was crowned during the ‘physical distancing’ months. The manual was introduced online to students and it is available to them for free download as they navigate their career and job opportunities.

Digitalization is impacting all sectors and it is here to stay. Therefore, this created experience is important to guarantee continuity of career services. Efficient career services require adequate resources, capacities and infrastructure. Having the management of universities on board to enable these resources becomes crucial, therefore we salute the commitment of our partners, and invite more universities to follow.