Three things of interest.
Regards
Bradley Smith
Executive Director
Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies
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1. Australian
Graduate survey 2006.
Every year, Graduate Careers
Australia (GCA) conduct the Australian Graduate Survey, which produces
data on course experience and a ‘snapshot’ of graduates’ experience in the
labour market about 4 months after graduation. The data are packaged in three
key reports – Graduate Destinations, Graduate Salaries and Course
Experience Questionnaire.
On Wednesday 25 July, GCA released the 2006 reports, which track the
experiences of the 2005 cohort. The survey was sent to undergraduate,
postgraduate, domestic and international students and GCA received 115,603
responses from a total of 205,139 graduates.
Key findings about science are:
Minister Bishop has initiate a
‘Scientists in Schools’ program which aims to place scientists in schools to
provide valuable ideas and inspiration for teachers and students.
The program will be piloted in the latter part of this year and the aim is to
place 500 scientists in 500 schools.
The program is being administered through CSIRO education. More details
including registrations are available through this website - http://www.scientistsinschools.edu.au
FASTS encourage all societies to participate if at all possible and I hope you
can circulate this information to you members.
Please note that scientists who undertake any type of interaction with students
are required by State and Federal governments to undergo police security
screening. If you haven’t already undergone a security screening through the
Australian Federal Police (or equivalent), the Scientists in Schools programme
will help you arrange this before you commence your partnership with a school.
The Scientists in Schools programme will provide support materials to all
scientists who are partnered with a school through the programme. This support
material will include:
€ information and tips
about working with schools, teachers and students
€ ideas for establishing
and maintaining a partnership with a school
€ teaching and learning
materials that can be used with students.
There is no charge to register for Scientists in Schools or to be
partnered with a school. However, the program is unable to pay for scientists
time or costs incurred through the partnership apart from teaching and learning
materials.
Research, innovation and knowledge transfer is the fourth
seminar in the Education, Science and the Future of Australia public seminar
series presented by the University of Melbourne.
This seminar will examine Australia’s research and research training capacity
in the light of international trends in research. Key topics to be discussed
will include: the funding of research by government, corporations and donors;
the agencies involved in research and research partnerships; the role of
universities; the tax treatment of research; and the communication of research
transfer, knowledge transfer and commercialisation.
The two key note speakers are Professor Ian Chubb, Vice-Chancellor ,
Australian National University and Professor Margaret Gardner, Vice-Chancellor,
RMIT University. The session will be chaired by Professor Peter Doherty.
Monday 6 August 2007, 6.00-8.30pm in the Woodward Centre, Melbourne Law School,
level 10, 185 Pelham St, Carlton (light refreshments are available from 6.00pm –
6.30pm)
To register and for information about the seminar series, speakers, parking
arrangements and maps please log onto
http://www.cshe.unimelb.edu.au/publicpolicyseminars/seminar4.html