Professor Joe Chicharo . . . elected President of the new Australian ...

Informatics Dean appointed President of new peak body

The Dean of the Faculty of Informatics at the University of Wollongong, Professor Joe Chicharo, has been appointed President of the first ever peak body to represent the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector across all Australian universities.

He was elected President of the Australian Council of Deans of ICT at the inaugural meeting of the new peak body held in Sydney on July 25.

Professor Chicharo said it was very successful meeting and the new body was already preparing a submission for the Higher Education Bradley Review.

He said universities across Australia were determined to turn around the dramatic decline in undergraduate student enrolments in ICT degrees.

Between 2001-2007 there has been a 50 per cent decline in Australia in the number of undergraduate students enrolling in ICT degrees. And yet, according to the Federal Government’s Labour Supply and Skills Branch, the marketplace is crying out for ICT graduates with indications of strong long-term growth in employment for ICT professionals.

ICT disciplines generally include electrical engineering, computer engineering, computer science, information systems, information technology, software engineering and telecommunications engineering.

Professor Chicharo said the ICT sector has been fragmented for too long and the new peak body could now speak with one voice to the government, industry and other professional bodies and education providers.

The country’s universities reacted en masse to turn around the dramatic decline in student ICT enrolments with representatives from 38 universities attending the inaugural Sydney meeting.

Strong support for the new peak body has also come from such organisations as the Australian Computer Society and the Australian Information Industry Association.