More than 300 high school students from across QLD and northern-NSW workshopped Australia’s most in-demand skills for jobs of the future when they met in Brisbane last week – and the results have offered fresh perspectives.
The annual QUT Future You Summit was held across the Gardens Point and Kelvin Grove campuses of Queensland University of Technology (QUT) from 1-5 July.
The group of Year 11 and 12 students – who were selected from metropolitan and regional schools for their academic and future-ready potential – joined industry and academic experts in science, business and creative industries.
Motivating young minds
Rashan Senanayake, CEO of Inspired Education Australia; Rowena Barrett, Pro Vice-Chancellor of Entrepreneurship; and Damián Cardona Onsés, Director of the United Nations Information Centre in Canberra, were part of the line-up of leading minds selected who shared their knowledge, skills and first-hand on-the-job experience with students.
“Data science and digital communication, robotics, materials science, healthcare design and delivery have all been identified as some of Australia’s most in-demand fields for future growth, and as these industries continue to change at a rapid pace, it’s imperative that our future workforce is prepared,” QUT Vice-Chancellor Professor Margaret Sheil AO says.
“This future-ready workforce is exactly what we’re looking to unlock with the 2024 Summit. By providing these high school students with first-hand insight into the most applicable careers for our current and future industries, we’re both supporting their individual career pathways and our wider workforce preparedness.”
Students were grouped into different streams based on their interests, with all addressing specific industry needs, like business innovation, AI and leading technologies and creative thinking.
Kirwan State High School student, Tara Budai, travelled from Townsville to Brisbane for the Summit with a goal to learn about advertising, fashion and industrial design.
“Choosing your whole career path at 17 can be extremely daunting, particularly when moving away from home for uni, so I’m excited to learn from some of the most successful minds in Australia, get a taste for what university is really like and most importantly, know which skills I should be focused on to prepare for future jobs,” Budai says.
She told EducationDaily that her current career aspirations are “something in communications” and says she found out about the conference after her Ancient History teacher shared the details with her and encouraged her to attend.
“I definitely thought it was worthwhile,” she says.
“There were lots of opportunities to interact with industry people but also uni alumni. I think it would have helped narrow down study pathways and career ideas for a lot of people.”
The summit’s spotlight on upskilling students from regional areas to support greater opportunities outside of metro areas, was described by QUT Pro Vice-Chancellor of Entrepreneurship and Regional Innovation, Rowena Barrett, as imperative to ensuring a more diverse entrepreneurial future.
“This year over a quarter of our attending students (27 per cent) will hail from regional Queensland and New South Wales. This will really help us showcase the raw opportunity across regional Australia,” Barrett says.
“To be truly innovative, entrepreneurialism needs diversity, and balancing regional and city thinkers is critical to this. We often find that students from remote hometowns are more naturally innovative thinkers, and when they return home as graduates, they can make a real impact in unlocking new possibilities within the region and supporting their direct community.”
With more than 50 experts from a diverse range of disciplines to meet throughout the four-day experience, attending students participated in a variety of interactive sessions, presentations and networking events.
For Barret, the Entrepreneurship Bootcamp on the final day of the Summit was a highlight.
Students worked in teams to apply design-led thinking process to participate in a rapid ideation and pitching session and develop an innovative and entrepreneurial solution to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals that gave them a real experience of boardroom pitching.
“Watching them be given an idea, then have the confidence to collaborate, then get up and pitch their thoughts to a room full of people was absolutely amazing,” she told EducationDaily.
“I definitely think the future is in good hands.”
