IT human resources a big potential of Serbia, education system reforms needed for quicker development – The first eKapija round table held

The estimates show that the European Union will have 900,000 IT experts fewer than needed in the next five years, not all of them programmers. Meanwhile, as much as 90% of jobs in the future will require familiarity with IT in order stay competitive in the market.

Considering this data and the fact that Serbia already lacks 15,000 IT experts, the participants in the first eKapija round table “IT Human Resources – Potential for or Obstacle to Development” agreed that informal education might be a short-term solution, but that a total reformation of the education system was necessary in the long run. As well, it was pointed out that the state's task was to support and encourage IT companies through certain subsidies and tax allowances.

- The Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications is carrying out an array of projects through its programs whose goal is to informatize the education system, to which end we wish for every school to have a fast internet connection, which is why the Ministry has equipped them with computers. Since this sector is a great opportunity for Serbia, one of the main projects is the Digital School, through which we're trying to help as many students as possible to decide to study technical sciences. Other programs include Smart and Safe, which deals with internet risks and the IT sector potentials and the teachers competition Digital Class. Also, the Ministry plans to set aside over 2 million dinars for the retraining of unemployed women for the employment in the IT sector – said Sava Savic, Assistant Minister for the Information Society at the Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications.

Snezana Markovic, Assistant Minister for secondary education and adult education at the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, cited the results of the research carried out on the population of eighth-grade students, which showed that 60% of them had given wrong answers to informatics questions which are part of the core curriculum.

- On the other hand, they spend 5 hours every work day and 7 hours on weekends in front of their computers, but by the eighth grade half of them never used a computer for studying purposes. So, our children are digitally skillful, but not digitally competent, and one of the reasons for this is that high school students are already 17 by the time they encounter programming, which is already late for the development of algorithmic thinking – said Snezana Markovic and added that one had to act quickly to solve the problem of IT human resources.

The participants of the round table were discussing admission quotas at faculties when Snezana Markovic said that she didn't think that high school graduates had enough potential for institutions of higher education to increase the number of students, whereas Milovan Suvakov, Assistant Minister for development and high education at the Ministry of Education, thought that “there are enough potential students”.

- The IT sector is getting more and more popular, but the admission quotas are not subject to the state's authority, they are a thing of the market and institutions of higher education set them themselves, wheres the state only decides on the budget quotas. When it comes to the problem of IT human resources, I think that two things are crucial, the first of which is the lack of human resources among the professors who should educate the students, because the market is draining the human resources who train students, which is why it's hard, for example, to keep good assistant professors at faculties. We need to change the model of financing as a response to the labor market and need to react quickly, and as for the short-term solutions, they could be public-private partnerships, especially in 2- and 3-year courses, that is, through dual education and the link between economy and education. Another possible solution is additional education, with or without the state's co-financing.

Secretary General at the National Council for Higher Education Miodrag Popovic is worried about the state of the institutions of higher education, which, according to, him, operate at a minimal standard and are barely surviving with the state's help. He also emphasized the problem of human resources among the educators, professors and assistant professors and an insufficiently large pool of potential students.

One of the solutions to the problem of human resources was presented by Milan Novakovic, Deputy Manager at the Development Center of Microsoft Serbia, who said that there was an option for the people already working in IT to become directly involved in the education by providing examples and preparing presentations.

In accordance with that, Marijana Despotovic Zrakic, the head of the Department of e-business at the Faculty of Organizational Sciences, reminded that big IT companies invested large amounts of money in research and development, thus practically tying themselves to the faculties, institutes and students who later became their employees.

- As a faculty, we are not too interested in increasing admission quotas, but we are very interested in master studies quotas. I think our opportunity lies in the development of master studies and in investing in software, which is a finished product, and it has been estimated that by 2020 it will make up 4% of Serbia's export, which is around EUR 2 billion.

Goran Obradovic, Delivery Unit Manager of the company Endava, which was eKapija's partner in organizing the round table, advocated for a quicker education system in place of the overlong five-year programs, since they made the academic world lag behind the market, and he also emphasized the need for the partnership between the state and the private sector.

The opposing view was presented by Milan Solaja, CEO at Vojvodina ICT Cluster, who said that a systematic approach to the solution was needed, by introducing informatics education beginning with the first grade of primary school, but also by stimulating the culture of entrepreneurship and giving support through the infrastructure, as well as digitalizing the public administration.

GALLERY