Why do higher learning for four years when it is needed for forty?
Over the next decade, Australia’s professional workforce will surge by 20%. The changing nature of work and the workforce mean that universities will need to skill people across their career, not just serve up predefined qualifications for only a handful of years before they start work.
For their part, universities can look to skill-led higher learning to fuel the next 30 years of their global online growth, just as international student tuition has since the mid 1990’s.
But first, the sector must make a new education economy. Tagging journal papers to fluff up university reputations seemed crazy thirty years ago, just like indexing skill-led learning may feel today. Things will change.
New revenue and new contributions are just what the sector wants, given declining domestic markets, tightening competition for transnational students and wilting research ranks.
Skill-led higher learning is about universities stepping up to become trusted knowledge partners to people throughout their careers.
As people build their careers, learning goals are defined, readiness is diagnosed, people engage with curated curriculum, then assessment signposts progress and steps ahead. People get all and only what they need to succeed. Universities make fuller and more nimble use of existing resources.
Domestic demand is aching for skill-led higher learning as Australia’s economy tilts towards the professional workforce, work itself changes, and the need for upskilling spikes.
Universities have already made baby steps towards this prize. Short-form study has been propagated. Microcredentials sprout. Education is parcelled and tagged online. Exiting and commendable momentum.
But isolated initiatives can confuse and no single institutions can make this change by itself. Regulatory revision is needed. New markets must be made. Broader incentives are needed to step beyond roadblocks and blend flurries into a gale.
Universities need to get excited about tapping into 40-year learning journeys. They need to curate online resources into new packages, and get each class whirling for more than just a few hours each year. Regulators need to recognise learning not just qualifications. Busy professionals need to see how tangible learning creates wealth. Industries, firms and regions need to step-up map out needs.
Almost certainly this will be a global online market, where learning can be ported around and built into all kinds of novel futures. Australia is well positioned, and it would be scary to be left behind.
A few rich countries have already turned the sod, including the United States, Korea, Singapore and China. It is time for Australia to kick-start its skill-led higher learning economy. Skill-led higher learning can turbo-charge Australian universities if the sector makes this market and the leap needed to engage.
Professor Hamish Coates is professor of public policy, director of the Higher Education Futures Lab, and global tertiary education expert. Full and summary briefing: www.hefl.net.
