A solution to the challenge of recruiting graduates to the computer industry has been initiated by Charles Sturt University (CSU) and a group of industry partners.

 

Companies such as IBM, Essential Energy and the NSW Government’s Land and Property Information office are working closely with CSU to provide work placement for IT students.

 

“Charles Sturt University is in a unique position where it can offer its Bachelor of Information Technology (Business Services)    students a $30,000 grant as part of their fully accredited IT degree,” said Mr Errol Chopping, Director of Industry Placement in the School of Computing and Mathematics at CSU.

 

“Students study for four years and get a three-year accredited IT degree, a full one-year integrated work placement with a host company and they also each get a $30 000 scholarship. They finish up with a degree, work experience and all their fees paid.”

 

Owned by the NSW Government, Essential Energy has approximately 4 600 employees providing essential network services to more than 800 000 households and businesses. Essential Energy’s Application Delivery Group Manager, Mr Graeme Sutton, supports the CSU program. “It’s often difficult to recruit graduates when they have a degree but an empty resume in terms of work experience. There’s very little knowledge of their strengths and they often have no experience working in a corporate environment. With the work placement program, we know the students’ capabilities and they are already familiar with the organisation and how it operates.”

 

Students undertaking work placement at Essential Energy as part of their degree are given a broad understanding of how the company’s IT division works.

 

“Students begin their part-time work at Essential Energy during the first semester of their second year with a general orientation of our systems and projects,” Mr Sutton said. “Their tasks revolve around understanding how the IT division operates and they rotate through a few areas of IT to understand what each area does”.

 

“In their third year they continue part-time work for another semester and are allocated to an area they are interested in and that is useful to the organisation. Quite often they deliver specific pieces of work of value to the organisation. In their last year of the degree they work full-time for one semester in a nominated department.”

 

IBM Australia grabbed the opportunity to build a relationship with CSU when they opened their regional centre in Bathurst more than five years ago as the company’s Delivery Program Manager Mr Tim Bylsma explains.

 

“When we first opened the regional centre a key focus was to attract good people to work for IBM Australia and we found a mixture of ways to resource those people,” Mr Bylsma said. “We saw the potential to establish a relationship with Charles Sturt University to identify high calibre students to bring through our graduate program. As part of the work placement built into the Business Services degree, we get to see students perform on 'real' projects. Those that perform well have the opportunity to continue in a full-time capacity at the end of their degree.”

 

Mr Chopping believes more students can take up this opportunity. “We have 15 Bachelor of Information Technology (Business Services) students currently working with industry professionals and the professionals are keen to have more students working with them.

 

“Charles Sturt University and its partner companies are working hard to increase the number of students entering the degree. We would welcome applications for 2012 from capable students who are serious about their future careers. Prospective students who apply can expect to attend an interview later in the year.”