Trends in mining education, recruitment and employee development

The Australian National Skills Council has identified the mining industry as having one of the most acute skills shortages amongst all industries. (National Skills Council, 2023), Data gathered from surveys of the 10 Australian universities delivering mining programmes, (National Mining Engineering Academics Network E-Newsletter, 2023), and from the National Centre for Vocational Education Research, (NCVER, 2023), has been analysed to demonstrate trends that are occurring. Whilst the analysis has been for the entire mining sector, where appropriate, an emphasis on the coal industry has been highlighted. The major trends show a stagnant to decline in the traditional Bachelor of Mining Engineering programme, whilst there has been a significant growth in both the participant numbers and breadth of alternative pathways for both entry into the industry and then in-going employee development.