Academia and Business Collaboration: Helping to Guide the Future Direction of Higher Education
It is widely (but maybe not widely enough!) acknowledged that education and skills will be the determinant of Australia's next round of productivity growth and therefore economic growth and business success. They are also fundamental to overcoming disadvantage, and for effectively integrating Australia's current and future migrants. Yet, in recent years Australia's investment in higher education for its own citizens has not kept pace contributing to skills shortages, reduced productivity growth and with significant risks to quality.
The paper describes a variety of current collaborative initiatives ranging from the national and strategic, to articulation between universities and vocational education, and at the coalface level of faculty to business enterprise. The challenge is to use these and other initiatives much more effectively to support a dramatic and effective reinvestment in quality higher education, especially in science , mathematics and engineering and to significantly increase the quantum of industry/academia interaction.