Industry Deal To Boost It Trainees
The Age
Friday January 26, 2001
Victoria's Department of Education, Employment and Training is pairing with Cisco, the world's largest computer networking company, in a scheme to increase the number of IT-trained students entering the workforce.
``Australia has about 35,000 IT vacancies at present," said Kip Cole, director of marketing and strategic alliances for Cisco in Australia and New Zealand. ``We want to help train people to fill those gaps.
``It's part of our being a good corporate citizen, but it also helps our industry and, thus, our company."
The Cisco-designed course will be open to year 11 and 12 students at accredited Victorian schools and will be recognised as part of VCE studies, counting towards tertiary admission.
Education Minister Mary Delahunty, who launched the scheme yesterday, said such close cooperation between government and industry in shaping an educational course was unique in Australia.
She said the government was committed to expanding its vocational education and training (VET) schemes. In 1994, 400 students were enrolled in the VET program. The scheme will have an estimated 28,000 students in 2001.
The Cisco scheme is the first to be folded into the VCE.
Schools introducing the course will need to buy some computer networking equipment, but Cisco provide a 60 per cent discount as well as free all-course materials, lesson plans and teacher training.
Box Hill TAFE is the centre of the Cisco scheme in Australia, providing the training for teacher training in other centres, such as Bendigo Secondary College which, in turn, provided training for tutors at Bendigo TAFE.
© 2001 The Age
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