The social responsibility of dual education in an unstable environment

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: In a context of instability caused by various crises, including military crises, the higher education system is at great risk. Practice-oriented (dual) education is one of the most effective ways to address this problem. The innovation of this study is that for the first time a theoretical and practical model for involving all stakeholders in this process has been created and tested. The aim of the article is to substantiate a socially responsible dual education system in an unstable environment.METHODS: In terms of objective, this is an applied and quantitative study. The study population is estimated at 13 universities, 10 companies, 50 students between November 2021 and November 2022. The sample size is estimated using the Cochrane formula. A standard 5-point Likert scale questionnaire was used to collect data, where groups of questions corresponded to 4 hypotheses. All data were investigated by factor and cluster analysis using STATISTICA software (version 10.0).FINDINGS: All four hypotheses were confirmed. Before the war, the first and second hypotheses were prioritized. According to them, the process approach of social responsibility of dual education allows designing and launching a system of social responsibility of dual education and creating a talent pool at the employing enterprise. After the outbreak of hostilities, the priorities changed. The third and fourth hypotheses allow, through the organization of supportive (enabling) processes, to ensure the effective functioning of the system. As a result, the majority of stakeholders (31%) consider it necessary to modernize the mentoring system and provide graduates with relevant professional skills, while methodological and career guidance came in second and third (16% and 13% respectively).CONCLUSION: Using the theoretical and practical model of formation and implementation of dual education in the unstable conditions of Ukraine will help to solve the problems of the country out of crisis, post-war recovery of higher education system, to bring the requirements of production with the possibilities of training specialists in universities and can be applied in other countries in a similar situation.