Labour Affairs Bureau (DSAL) Vice Director Chan Un Tong told reporters yesterday that information has been collected on the participants in the bureau’s ongoing three-month “career experience” scheme for local university graduates, adding that over 70 percent of them received a full-time offer with an average monthly salary of 15,000 patacas.
Chan made the remarks at the bureau’s headquarters before an experience-sharing session on the “career experience” scheme.
According to a previous statement by the bureau, the “career experience” scheme is a paid internship programme exclusively for local university graduates to allow them to gain some career experience through internships and strengthen their career competitiveness and employment opportunities. Participating companies are from various sectors, such as public utilities, banking, and leisure, the statement underlined.
Chan told reporters yesterday that the programme attracted 436 participants, pointing out that companies responded to the bureau saying that they would like to recruit 344 for full-time positions. Chan said that the participants’ average monthly salary is 15,000 patacas, which meets the market average. He also said that the monthly salary varies between job positions and sectors.
According to Chan, there were 1,618 signups for the programme, 1,350 of which satisfied the requirements of the programme. Over 720 positions were available for the participants, but only 436 people worked throughout their internships. Chan said that some participants left their internship because they got a job offer, decided to continue studying, could not adapt to the working life, or the internship was not aligned with their major or other reasons.
Chan said that through the three-month internship programme, participants could learn more about work ethics, work skills and gain practical knowledge about their profession. He added that this hands-on experience allowed participants to also learn more about having a proper work attitude, communication skills and teamwork. He stressed that having internship experiences could help one to expand personal relationships, establish proper professional values and prepare one for a future career development to increase competitiveness in the labour market.
At yesterday’s closed-door event, the bureau invited companies’ representatives and internship participants to share their work experience and provide feedback about the scheme.
The scheme is ending this month.
The Labour Affairs Bureau (DSAL) Vice Director Chan Un Tong talks to reporters yesterday on the sidelines of the bureau’s experience sharing session about its “career experience” scheme at its headquarters. Photo Courtesy: TDM
