ICT Graduate Schools stakeholder workshops Background and Preview July 2014

The ongoing growth of ICT technology ICT technology continues to advance at a rate of knots. Increasingly, these developments disrupt business models and shape our personal lives. As these new technologies are rolled out and adopted, they enable further adoption of more intelligent industry-specific solutions. For example, industries are currently adapting to the disruptive combination of ›Adoption of cloud computing ›Rapid penetration of mobile devices and technologies ›Emergence of Big Data analytics ›Adoption of social technologies

The opportunity for an innovation led NZ economy is here for the taking ›This will engage billions of users and generate new technologies, sustaining a new intelligent economy. ›It also represents a change of scale in the size and depth of the ICT market, both in terms of the number of users, the number of connected devices, and the number of applications and services. In 2012 New Zealand exported $659m worth of IT Services 1 1 Worldwide, the ICT industry is expected to grow by US $1.3 trillion between 2013 and 2020 – generating $5 trillion worth of spending in New Zealand is in a unique position to benefit from growth in ICT technology, which increasingly cuts across the geographic boundaries that have inhibited our productivity. We see an opportunity for New Zealand to take a leading position in the global the ICT industry.

To seize this opportunity, cutting edge ICT education and research is essential For New Zealand to become a world leader in ICT technology, we need more: ›Students with the high-level ICT skills needed by the industry to incite a significant industry shift, combined with the business and entrepreneurial acumen to succeed in a demanding, fast-paced future ›Research that is aligned to the emerging demands of industry and will help NZ firms to compete internationally Developing the cutting edge technology and skills that innovative businesses need to thrive This will create a talent pipeline for employers, while paving clear career pathways for students into a high- tech, high-value industries

The ICT skills outlook ›ICT is changing fast and so is the demand for specific technology skills ›A strong core technology and theoretical education will form a platform on which future specific technology skills can be built ›In addition to these technical skills, “soft” skills such as business acumen, communication, team working and entrepreneurship are becoming increasingly essential as business models adapt to new technologies The ICT skills market is becoming increasingly complex and will demand significant and meaningful collaboration between industry and education providers

Connecting students and researchers with industry Budget has dedicated $28.4m for the next four years for this programme with an expectation that there will be ›Partnerships between education providers and businesses to deliver the ICT Graduate School programme ›Graduates with industry focussed technical and soft skills ›Connections with innovation precincts and the rest of the innovation system ›Clear and tangible career pathways for students ›Creation of cutting edge knowledge through industry focussed research The ICT Graduate Schools provide an opportunity to develop new knowledge and give students cutting edge ICT skills through the creation of genuine industry and education provider partnerships. This is a chance to think about education differently.

Why take a market/RfP approach? We want to tap into the expertise out there in industry and the education sector - you are best placed to tell us what’s required and how to deliver it. A market approach offers an opportunity for you, as industry and education providers, to work together to develop innovative solutions around what the ICT Schools could look like and how industry focussed ICT education should be delivered. An independent panel of experts, comprising representatives from the education, industry and government sectors will assess the proposals.

The stakeholder workshops These workshops will provide stakeholders an opportunity to contribute to the development of the ICT Graduate Schools policy. There will be two discussion sessions at each workshop, focusing respectively on two overarching questions ›What are the outcomes that we want these Graduate Schools to achieve? ›How can we ensure that the schools achieve these outcomes? We will summarise and published the findings from the workshops so they will be accessible to all potential tender respondents. The output of these discussions will ultimately help to determine the criteria that will be used to assess the models that consortia propose.

After the workshops – next steps… Based on the findings from the workshops and in consultation with our expert panel, we will formulate a set of outcomes that the Graduate Schools should achieve. We will issue a request for proposals (RfP) for consortia of stakeholders to develop models for schools that will achieve those outcomes. The expert panel will assess the proposals, and recommend those that will best achieve the desired outcomes. The TEC and MBIE will work with successful consortia to help implement their proposals. We expect final decisions on school operators to be made early next year and implementation to begin from mid 2015.

References and Further Reading References 1.MBIE: 2013 ICT Sectors Report report-information-communication-technology.pdfhttp:// report-information-communication-technology.pdf 2.Skills Ireland: Addressing ICT Skills Other Interesting Reading Innovation Precincts The Government’s Business Growth Agenda: Building Innovation Productivity Commission: Boosting productivity in the services sector (esp. chapter 10: Supply and demand for IT skills) Christchurch Development Corporation: ICT Sector Workforce Survey Report ICT Industry Reports