The last of many University graduation ceremonies was held yesterday, bringing to a close a hectic but pleasant time for the campus administration. In all, 2,663 students graduated, a remarkable number indeed.

Last week, another 703 students graduated, this time from the Malta College of the Arts, Science and Technology. Another graduation ceremony was held at the Institute of Tourism Studies.

All these students have fulfilled their dream. They have completed a course they chose a few years ago, perhaps after months of hard thinking. Some people know very early on in life what they want to do “when they grow up”; others have to weigh the pros and cons before making up their mind.

But that is now history. They must now look forward to their next challenge. And it will probably be harder than all the hours they spent locked up in their rooms or at the university library.

This is because, hard as it was, life at university or at MCAST is not as difficult as life in the world of work.

Many of the young people who graduated over the past days already have a job; others are still looking for one. In the world of work, it does not take long to find out that what was learnt in theory does not always work in practice, and that what takes place in offices and other workplaces is completely different from the scenario one would have imagined while sitting in a lecture room.

And this is perhaps why the university and MCAST should do their utmost to improve the already excellent standards of their courses by giving the students better opportunities to experience what happens at work while they are still studying.

There are some courses, such as teaching, that do give this opportunity. Others, however, still ignore this possibility, with the result that once graduated, the “students” simply have no idea of what “really” goes on, and there have been times when they were literally “shocked” at what they found. Some even end up working in a completely different environment to the one they had studied for so hard for so many years.

Having said that, we should all be proud of what the University and MCAST manage to achieve every year. It is no joke to turn out more than 3,000 graduates every year. When one remembers that 20 years ago, only a couple of hundred students graduated from University each year from the limited number of courses available, one realises what a massive step this country has made.

Equally important is that the great majority of these graduates are finding employment, and managing to do this quickly too. They are being absorbed in the employment sector year after year, meaning that the country’s economy has developed to such an extent that the number of jobs being created is enough to meet with the demand.

If anything, the question that needs to be asked is whether or not the University and MCAST will continue to turn out enough people to meet the exigencies of the future, such as, for example, when SmartCity will be ready to accept its first employees. One hopes that the expansion that is being programmed for MCAST by the government over the next few years will satisfy those needs.

It is also imperative that students are directed towards those areas which, we know, will need more and more personnel in the near future. We will still need our doctors and lawyers, but we need more people in areas that are growing such as IT and the pharmaceutical industry.

The Malta Independent takes the opportunity to congratulate all the students who graduated from the university, MCAST and ITS over the past days.