A partnership between Newcastle education institutions and Lockheed Martin, the company delivering Australia’s new F-35 fighter jets, will see students undertake training specifically suited to a future career in the company.
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The project involving Lockheed Martin, the University of Newcastle, TAFE NSW and Regional Development Australia Hunter (RDA Hunter) was announced during a careers expo for high school students at Williamtown’s Fighter World on Thursday.
“Lockheed Martin’s future workforce requirements are a little bit niche compared to other defence industry players,” Rick Evans, RDA Hunter workforce manager said.
“So we’ve done partnerships with a vocational training institution and a university. It’s utilising existing courses and enhancing them.”
Mr Evans said the TAFE NSW partnership “STEMstart” would train 16 students each year for three years in “ICT and cyber security”, from next April.
“It’s an 18 month training program with as much integration with Lockheed Martin and other related companies until the end of the project, coming out with a Diploma of Information and Communication Technology,” he said.
Jobs are not guaranteed at the end of the program but the intake of students was based on the company’s “projected needs”, an RDA Hunter spokesperson said.
Details of the university program “Altitude Accord” would be released next year but it would include a “number” of scholarships, Mr Evans said.
Vince Di Pietro, Lockheed Martin Australia’s chief executive, said it was in the company’s best interest to “raise the technology base in this region”.
Visit Regional Development Australia Hunter for more information.
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