FAITH Lutheran College year 12 students learning real world experience at school, successfully organising and hosting their Back 2 Business Conference.
As part of their business curriculum, students held workshops focusing on financial and operations management, tourism and legal topics learnt in class and invited guest speakers on Tuesday.
Parking Deals Australia founder Rylan Kindness spoke about the importance of real world experiences while others talked about creating a start up business and how social media can be used as data collection.
Faith Lutheran College Redlands principal Shane Altmann said schools should be looking more at creating real world scenarios for students, using practical studies like the Back 2 Business event.
“This event moves beyond scenario planning and places students in a space where they have to take the planning and make it happen,” he said.
“This is not merely an intellectual exercise.
“There is real world experience in having to contact presenters, pull together schedules, deal with changes to plans, create communications with the community and so on.”
Mr Altmann said the college used a practical event as a powerful learning exercise.
“Most schools have vocational and training pathways that sit parallel with traditional academic pathways as we do,” he said.
“Faith Lutheran College Redlands however, is actively engaged in re-imagining and re-thinking education beyond a traditional model by seeking authentic opportunities for students to engage with learning in a way that is relevant to their real-world needs.”
On track
Mr Altmann said tweaking educational experiences so students could improve skills such as innovation, problem solving and creativity was at the forefront of their work at the college.
“Simply remembering some facts and regurgitating them in an assignment or exam does little to grow learning or understanding, at the very least it is lower order thinking.”
The college is on the right track following a report by Mitchell Institute at Victoria University found there was a need for more partnerships between companies and schools to better prepare students for the workforce.
Mitchell Institute director Megan O’Connell said some students had access to valuable experiences like industry mentoring and entrepreneurship programs but this was not the case for all students.
“We need to make sure every student can access meaningful experiences that provide connections with people outside of usual school and family networks,” she said.
“All students should be able to think about how the world of work aligns with their passions and interests at school.
“Partnerships between schools and industry is one of the best ways to make sure students understand and develop the skills they need for their future careers, so this needs to be a priority for all Australian schools.”
Jocelyn Garcia
Jocelyn is a journalist at the Redland City Bulletin, covering education issues and school stories. She was a former journalist at Beaudesert Times, reporting about crime, schools and agriculture.
Jocelyn is a journalist at the Redland City Bulletin, covering education issues and school stories. She was a former journalist at Beaudesert Times, reporting about crime, schools and agriculture.
