The thesis describes the development of scientific and methodological principles and organizational mechanisms of the dual studies management in Ukraine given the national socio-economic context and global trends (transition to the knowledge-based economy, automation, polarization and change of the character of jobs caused by technological disruption and digitalization, existing skill-gap etc). The paper examines the relationship between dual studies management introduction and human capital development, innovations, youth unemployment reduction, individual and societal well-being, advancement of competitiveness on the labor market, etc.
The author has studied the organizational and economic relations that arise between businesses, higher education institutions, students, regulatory institutions and other stakeholders in the framework of dual studies management introduction and implementation.
The conceptual basis of the dual studies management formation has been improved, which is defined as a set of organizational and managerial mechanisms for coordination of complex network interconnections between stakeholders at the macro level (harmonization of regulatory and managerial mechanisms at the level of intersectoral and inter-agency cooperation aimed at the formation of the national dual studies management system and its implementation), at the meso level (cooperation within the education sector, cooperation between employers and their associations within other sectors, as well as among economic entities in the region for the formation of regional dual studies management clusters) and at the micro level (managerial mechanisms of interaction between higher educational establishments, employers and students, as well as structural and functional transformations within the higher educational establishments and enterprises due to the introduction of the dual studies management).
The analysis of historical, political, economic, social and cultural factors influencing the formation of the German and Ukrainian dual studies management patterns has been carried out. In addition, the scientific principles of establishing benchmarks for the domestic dual studies management system development have been further elaborated by means of the identification of organizational and managerial «gaps» between the Ukrainian and German dual studies management systems.
A system for monitoring the introduction and development of the dual studies management in Ukraine has been developed as a three-level system of indicators: at the macro level - for the Ministry of Education and Science (16 indicators); at the meso level - for local governments and sectoral associations of employers (6 indicators); and at the micro level - for higher educational establishments and employers (8 indicators).
A scientific and methodological approach to dual studies cost management has been proposed for the two models – with practical and with professional training integration. The calculation of enterprises’ costs for training of a dual student within the practical training model includes the following groups of costs: annual costs (optional and recommended costs), costs for the periods of an applicant's work-based training periods (optional and mandatory) and one-time costs (methodological and organizational). For the model with professional training integration, it is proposed to include optional, mandatory and organizational costs in the structure of the enterprise's expenses for training of one dual student. For each of these types of costs, a mechanism for their calculation has been developed, which takes into account such cost items as the number of mentors involved in their training, the cost of work of the coordinator from a company, as well as costs of the training of mentors, etc.
The methodological basis of scenario planning of perspective development of dual studies management system has been further developed, which, unlike the existing ones, is based on Bass's theory of diffusion of innovations and takes into account the results of innovators' evaluation of dual studies management quality and market capacity of dual studies services. According to the long-term scenario planning of the dual studies development in Ukraine, there are three possible scenarios - optimistic, realistic and pessimistic. Given factors such as the declining number of higher education institutions, the unfavorable economic situation, the passive position of private higher education institutions, the lack of a broad information campaign among employers, and the small number of professional standards developed, the often formal attitude of stakeholders to innovation, etc. we consider a pessimistic scenario as the most probable.
