Unemployment among university graduates in Tunisia is a serious problem, and one that many believe contributed to the recent revolution there. The success of the government’s “free education for all” policy has enabled thousands of young Tunisians to receive university degrees over the past years. Unfortunately, however, many of them have graduated without acquiring key skills that employers are seeking. 

In recent months, AMIDEAST has resumed its partnership with the government of Tunisia to implement a national training initiative that targets unemployed graduates for enhanced skills training. Under contracts with the Ministries of Education and Higher Education, AMIDEAST will provide 10,000 unemployed university graduates with test preparation for, and then administration of, the ETS Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC), globally recognized as a language certification tool for workplace English skills.

This new effort revives a national program aimed at helping unemployed university graduates that was suspended in 2009 due to the world financial crisis.  Launched by the Tunisian government in 2006, the program set out to provide training to university graduates in language skills (Arabic, French and English) and information technology (IT). Before its interruption, AMIDEAST had provided test preparation and TOEIC certification for 6,000 new university graduates.