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International conference examines employment and training

19 October 2005

The second international Conference on Training, Employability and Employment has been held at the Monash University Prato Centre.

The conference was organised by the university's Events Management Office on behalf of Monash's Centre for the Economics of Education and Training. It followed the success of the first Conference on Training, Employability and Employment at the Monash London Centre in 2002.

More than 50 participants from academia, government, training bodies and unions attended last month's conference to examine the nature and role of training and development in restructuring of work and employment.

Prato centre director Dr Annamaria Pagliaro said the conference had been a great success.

"Dr Richard Cooney, from Monash's Department of Management and the conference organiser, has been approached by local institutions in Prato to discuss possible research collaborations," Dr Pagliaro said.

"He has also been invited to an international conference organised by the Prato provincial government, in collaboration with other EU countries, to be held at the Monash centre in November.

"The high standard of papers presented at the conference has led to the commissioning of a special issue of the Industrial Relations Journal -- which covers industrial relations research around the world -- focusing on training and employment relations."

Forty-five papers were presented by representatives from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden, Turkey, the UK and Qatar.

The keynote address was delivered by Professor Gerhard Bosch, a professor of sociology at Duisburg-Essen University, Germany, and vice-president of the Institute for Work and Technology at Gelsenkirchen, Germany.

Professor Bosch presented a comprehensive overview of recent developments in employment education and training in Europe, many of which are being examined by governments in Australia and New Zealand.

The Centre for the Economics of Education and Training is a joint venture of the Australian Council for Educational Research and Monash's faculties of Education and Business and Economics.

It specialises in research on the economic and social consequences of education and training and the internal efficiency of education.