The 2016 conference will be held in Hobart from 21-23 September with the 2016 theme of Create, Connect Collaborate. As always, the conference will provide professional development and up-to-date information to enable you to learn from and network with colleagues and peers from around Australia as well as government stakeholders, regulatory bodies and suppliers of products and services to the English language sector.

Conference theme

Create, Connect, Collaborate

After a period of policy and regulatory change and challenge in 2015, when the dust settles, what shape will the industry take?

All through 2015 we worked towards towards alignment in our government policy to make our industry highly competitive in the global space and re-position Australia as a leader in International Education. We now stand at the crest of another wave. Changes to the National Code, visa regulations and Streamlined Visa Processing (SVP) means we have been handed a clean slate, a blank canvas to determine the direction of our growth and to reshape the industry. We now need to look at what we do in new ways with new eyes.

The theme of Create, Connect, Collaborate aligns with both the key areas of the English Australia strategic plan and the three pillars of the draft national strategy for international education and will be the watchwords of our approach to the changes that are shaping our industry.

Create: We are poised to create a meaningful Australian experience for many more students coming to Australia. Creativity in instruction and delivery within the classroom means we are creating future leaders, fully competent language users, critical thinkers, and constructive social change agents who will value their Australian experience and qualification.

Connect: We live in the age of the connected educator where teachers look beyond the classroom and course books to develop their learners’ higher-order thinking skills, effective communication skills, and knowledge of technology. Personal Learning Networks and social connectivity is crucial for the reflective practitioners as it is for our learners and because there is no one-size fits all solution to learning, plugging into the best the rest of the world has to offer, is essential.

Collaborate: As an industry, we are highly competitive yet collaborative both across the public and private sector and this is our greatest strength.  With the new visa program and the review of SVP the playing field has been levelled to provide genuine operators a fair chance to play and compete as equals.

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