Australia’s educational institutions have a great reputation overseas. We currently educate many overseas students. However ,I don’t believe we are leveraging our educational abilities to the maximum benefit of our country. Education is becoming increasingly vital and will do so into the foreseeable future.
It is estimated that the amount of new technical information is doubling every two years. This means that a student starting a four-year technical course, much of what they learn in their first year will be obsolete by time they graduate.
Gone are the days of one job for life. Most children today will have multiple careers throughout their lifetime. The procedures and skills they are learning today will change and change and change.
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This means that children today will be locked into continuous learning if they are not already.
Just as China produces the products to the world, India runs the world’s ICT departments and call centres, Australia should become the educator to the world. Currently we survive by digging things up and shipping it overseas: we need to look beyond this.
Australia currently has three educational systems, schooling for children where they gain general knowledge, Technical and Further Education (TAFE) colleges which are primarily concerned with teaching how to do things and the universities which are primarily concerned with teaching thinking and analysing.
In some respects, TAFE is ahead of the game. Their evolution of industry training packages, which identify the competencies to perform a job, are rolling out students who are highly equipped with the skills and knowledge to competently perform required tasks.
We currently teach what many overseas countries covet.
Australia currently has an ageing population of experienced industry personnel. We should be tapping into their skills and knowledge, training them to be teachers. We should be looking to building overseas student-only education facilities. If we become the educators to the world, this would mean an influx of overseas students. They will have money to spend and Australian businesses will benefit.
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In ten years time, education will become very important to one’s future.
In part two I will discuss how the media and jobs will change in the next ten years as a result of a move to a connecting, sharing, collaborating and creating world.
Facts stated in this article come from the research of Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Bronman shown in the video “Did you know?”. Sharing and collaborating concepts by Ralph Demuth, Director of Technical Sales, Services and Support, IBM Asia Pacific.
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