Last week, I was honoured to be an external consultant to the Egypt-OECD country programme which aims to be a key source of information, practices and guidance for the successful design and implementation of structural reforms to address Egypt’s main economic challenges.
My focus was specifically on aligning higher education with labour market needs and I had an intensive five days of meetings with government ministries, universities, and businesses to discuss a range of subjects including the integration of high-demand skills into study programmes, collaboration with employers in the design and delivery of the educational offer, and support for teaching staff to keep abreast with key developments in related industries.
But the learning process was not only one way, and it was an eye-opening experience to be find out more about what was happening within the Egyptian economy and how universities were supporting the process of economic transformation.
