Digital Talents Are More Needed, Skillvul Equips 1.100 Indonesian Students with Digital Skills

In order to encourage the growth of digital talent who are ready to work in Indonesia, Skillvul presenting the Certified Internship Program, the Skilvul Virtual Internship UI/UX Challenge, and the Certified Independent Study Program, Skilvul #Tech4Impact. Skilvul Virtual Internship and #Tech4Impact are specifically designed to equip students from various educational backgrounds with digital skills and concrete experience in the industry. These two programs are also a form of Skilvul's support for the Merdeka Campus, an initiative of the Indonesian Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology (Kemdikbudristek).

In fact, one of the biggest challenges in the world of work in Indonesia is the issue of mismatch or knowledge & practice gaps between educational institutions and industry needs. Therefore, the Skilvul collaboration program with Merdeka Campus aims to equip students with 21st century skills that are in line with the needs of the latest industry in Indonesia.

According to the World Economic Forum (World Economic Forum), technology proficiency is a skill the most important thing that must be owned by today's workforce. Research LinkedIn also found that 6 out of 10 skill most needed by companies are in the IT sector, such as: blockchain, cloud computing, data analysis, artificial intelligence development, UX/UI design, and scientific computing. Therefore, technology skills are a must-have for all students in order to get better job prospects in the future.

“The Skilvul Virtual Internship and Skilvul #Tech4impact programs provide opportunities for Information Technology (IT) and non-IT students from all over Indonesia to directly engage in solving challenges from Skilvul partners by designing digital solutions. In solving the challenges of technology companies and social organizations on a national to regional scale, students will gain a variety of digital competencies that are in line with industry needs, such as UX/UI design, web application development, soft skills, digital product portfolios, to being connected with industry partners. Skilvul for job opportunities,” explained Amanda Simandjuntak, Co-Founder and Chief of Product Skilvul.

The Skilvul initiative is in line with the discourse currently being pursued by the government. Ministry of Communication and Information of the Republic of Indonesia states that Indonesia needs at least 9 million digital talents by 2030 to take full advantage of the digital ecosystem – however, currently the number of talents available is only 1,1 million. Besides that, research from AlphaBeta said the domestic industry needs 110 million digital workers by 2025 and expertise in IT will be highly sought after, including by non-tech companies.

In an effort to meet these needs, the program Skills Virtual Internship present to facilitate 1.000 students from 172 campuses in Indonesia to learn skills with real case studies. Skilvul collaborates with well-known companies and social organizations, such as Amartha, Bank Jago, Crowde, Pasar Polis, Campaign.com, Kitabisa.com, Waste4Change, and Krealogi, to provide best practices and training on UX/UI design. Not only dominated by students majoring in IT, in fact almost 1 in 5 students from various other majors are interested in joining the program to increase their skills in UX/UI design.

Meanwhile, in the program #Tech4Impact, the participants had the opportunity to take part in a five-month digital innovation incubation program and help international companies and organizations such as the Asean Youth Organization, Asean Youth Forum, Danone Indonesia, National University of Singapore, Green Peace Indonesia, and MS Wellbeing Center, in solving social issues. related to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Indonesia. Of the more than 1.400 students who have registered, as many as 100 students from 50 campuses in Indonesia have been selected to join the program.

“We are very happy to see the high enthusiasm for the Skilvul Virtual Internship Program and #Tech4Impact, because we believe that technology skills must be inclusive and can be learned by every student. Currently, Indonesia needs up to 600.000 new digital talents per year. The existence of a collaboration program with Skilvul will certainly support the achievement of these targets," said Nurhadi Irbath, Head of the Independent Campus Certified Independent Study and Internship Program, Kemdikbudristek DIKTI.

Participants Can Convert Program Credit up to 20 SKS

The Skilvul Virtual Internship and #Tech4Impact implementation programs have officially started since August 2021. The Skilvul Virtual Internship includes the selection of challenges and industry partners according to participants' interests, private learning sessions and webinars, as well as project work on challenges. For the #Tech4Impact program, participants received a series of intensive digital product development training, full stack web and coding, as well as working on challenging projects from industry partners selected by participants.

As the highlight of the program, all participants will present their digital solutions and innovations in front of Skilvul industry partners at the same time Demo Day. Later, every participant who has completed the program will have the opportunity to get an industry certificate and convert this program into 20 Semester Credit Systems (SKS) at the home university.

"I didn't think I could be chosen from thousands of other applicants, especially not yet" basic in IT. For me who want to pursue entrepreneurship, the digital training provided by Skilvul will really support me for entrepreneurship later. Hopefully the program with impact Real social activities like this can continue for years to come,” said Rahmanita, an Accounting Student at Pakuan University Class of 2017 who participated in the Skilvul #Tech4Impact program.