TAMWORTH’S high school career advisers have banded together in a bid to highlight local job opportunities and help keep more students from leaving the region for work.
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In a first-of-its-kind project, Year 9-11 students at the nine high schools in the Tamworth Regional Council area will be surveyed about their work hopes, personal skills and “career lifestyle considerations”.
The region-wide survey will eventually form a profile of the city’s future employees and will be used in planning to help attract industries to Tamworth.
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Calrossy careers adviser and Tamworth councillor Charles didn’t believe a scheme like this had been done in Australia previously.
“Council will use this data to help attract the type of business that will house themselves in that [Tamworth Enterprise] area,” he said.
Next year, a new website will also be launched which will advertise local jobs to the region’s youth and give small businesses a chance to post their vacant positions for free.
The surveys are being conducted by a Sydney-based firm, Career HQ.
Education partnerships manager, Jess Pollard, said there hadn’t been a way to match-up career interest and the skills of the students and “how the skills that are available match the demand out there.”
“There is so much talk around the future world of work, around skills in the region,” she said.
“But this is about how do we create a collaborative community-wide approach to resourcing schools, teachers and parents to look at some economic development and questions around the region.”
While it’s seen as a way to help shape industry in town, the individual schools will be able to use their student data to shape programs.
McCarthy Catholic College adviser Susan Barrett said it would create a better pathway for students to careers.
“I see that as very valuable, for example, at McCarthy we have a lot of students looking at apprenticeships, we can then bring in employers to speak to those students,” she said.