During pandemic in Brazil, there was worsening unemployment and wage inequality for this range, known as the transition age to the job market.
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Published on the 3rd, the Education at a Glance report of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) evaluated the panorama of higher education and employment in the approximately 40 countries that are part of the group.
Main problems identified by the OECD
Regarding the Brazilian situation, the document highlights that:
- While 35,9% of young Brazilians between the ages of 18 and 24 are neither-nor, the average among OECD member countries is 16,6%.
- Only 33% of graduates manage to complete the course in the allotted time.
- 75% of higher education students are enrolled in independent private institutions.
- Only a small fraction of the Brazilian population has a master's degree (0,8%) and even fewer have a doctorate (0,3%).
- Unlike what generally occurs in public educational institutions in other countries, the workload of Brazilian teachers does not tend to decrease as their educational level advances.
Employment and diploma
According to the report, people with degrees were the least affected during the pandemic, or were able to regain employment more quickly. In all countries analyzed, completing higher education was associated with more job opportunities and better salaries.
The level of education has a particularly positive relationship with employment rates among women Brazilians, according to the report. 37% of those who had not completed high school were employed in 2021, compared to 78% of those with a college degree. In contrast, the numbers were 75% and 87% for men.
New models
This relationship, however, is not so direct according to the businessman. Andre Dratovsky, CEO and founder of educational fintech Elleve. He believes that, in Brazil, traditional, long-term training has played an increasingly less relevant role when hiring.
“In the past, you had a very predictable career. Today, knowledge is much more dynamic: what we learn in five years often becomes obsolete. We always need to update. And professional technical courses are a way to move or migrate within careers.”
According to André, “long-term courses no longer play such a relevant role for the market and employers of previous generations. As important as they are, they do not necessarily guarantee immediate employment or in a curto time lapse."
André points out that “employers look more at the knowledge and what the employee actually delivers than at the seal or diploma”.
Student credit
The fintech created by André uses a system that calculates the potential for employability and income generation based on short-term, “high-impact” courses chosen by clients, most of the time young and low-income.
The startup encourages the student, financing the chosen training with the so-called student loan, which has a low interest rate. Several small educational institutions team up in partnership with the startup, creating a channel to encourage job creation and active income. Each student, according to André, remains monitored by the company for a year after completing the course.
The funding trend appears to work towards permanence. According to a survey carried out by IDados This year, school dropout among students without private sector funding is higher than that observed in the public sector. To obtain the cost of a course, there are other possible ways in Brazil. One of them is the National Student Financing Fund (Fies), linked to performance in Enem. (Land)
Although the market is following the easing, there is still a lot to progress, argues André Dratovsky. “In Brazil we carry a cultural heritage and a paradigm that have always supported the idea that it is necessary to go through a long-term course to get a job”, he says.
