This award recognises collaboration driving exemplary skills development between at least one employer and/or industry body and at least one organisation delivering nationally recognised vocational education and training.
Meet the finalists in the Industry Collaboration category for the 2025 South Australian Training Awards – some truly amazing organisations!
Proudly sponsored by ATEC
Building Links (BL) and Build Your Career (BYC) are innovative programs delivered in partnership by SYC and the South Australian Housing Trust (SAHT).
These programs provide students with an accredited qualification and valuable construction experience by renovating SAHT properties. Designed to prepare participants for career pathways in construction, they address skills shortages while improving housing for South Australians without a secure home.
Each year, SAHT provides SYC with two properties and building materials for renovation, while also connecting students to employment opportunities with its contractors. SYC brings its expertise to deliver high-quality live-works training and assessment, with students completing specific aspects of real building works. In addition, SYC’s Success and Wellbeing Services support learners to complete their training by assisting with study skills and addressing personal barriers.
This collaboration not only contributes to meeting the construction industry’s skills shortages but also offers students an authentic experience of working in the sector and supports their transition into sustainable careers. Importantly, at the end of each project, a South Australian family can move into a newly renovated home that provides a safe and high-quality living environment.
The First Nations Foster and Kinship Carer Career Development Program aims to strengthen the First Nations Child Protection workforce in South Australia. While First Nations People make up only 2.47% of the state’s population, First Nations children represent 34.2% of all children in care, with a 33% increase over the past five years.
This program seeks to increase the number of First Nations professionals in child protection by credentialing volunteer workforces and combining cultural authority with vocational expertise. By empowering First Nations workers to take decision-making roles closer to critical intervention points, it supports culturally respectful and less intrusive interventions.
Through an innovative, culturally safe, and learner-focused training and assessment model, graduates are prepared to enter paid roles and eventually become trainers themselves. This approach ensures workforce sustainability, improves completion rates, and inspires more First Nations students to pursue qualifications, demonstrating that careers in child protection are both visible and achievable.
Pathways to Surveying: Building Futures through Education and Industry is a strategic collaboration between industry and education designed to address the national shortage of surveyors.
Led by Alexander Symonds and supported by Flinders University, TAFE SA, UniHub Spencer Gulf, SACOME, and various secondary schools, the initiative creates an education-to-employment pipeline, from early engagement through to graduate employment.
The collaboration introduces over 45 students annually to surveying through work experience, school holiday programs, and regional expos. Its strength lies in mutual benefit, shared purpose, and long-term commitment, which sustain the initiative and ensure ongoing impact.
Notably, 20% of Flinders University surveying students completed work experience at Alexander Symonds, with many employed while studying.
The collaboration delivers measurable results, promotes social equity, and offers a model that can be replicated across industries. Its sustainable design ensures it will continue to shape the future of the surveying profession in South Australia and beyond.
Formal partnerships with more than 40 leading employers underpins the South Australian Government Technical Colleges. Organisations such as BAE Systems Australia, ASC, BHP, Boeing, Goodstart Early Learning, SA Power Networks, SA Health, Bluescope Steel, Group Training Organisations and many others have shaped the student experience, the facilities and the training programs that ensures school students are equipped with the technical and employability skills to meet key industry workforce needs.
At the heart of this collaboration, is a shared commitment to addressing critical skills shortages and guaranteeing school students a fast-tracked pathway to a career in high-demand sectors such as defence, engineering, health, early childhood, and building and construction. By bridging the gap between school and employment, Technical Colleges provide transformative senior secondary education where school students learn in a work environment, are job ready at the end of year 11 with their SACE and able to complete the first year of their apprenticeship by the time they complete school.
This state-wide collaborative approach creates life-changing opportunities for students and contributes directly to South Australia’s economic growth, productivity and sustainability. It supports innovation, fosters stronger links between industry and school education, and builds a skilled, job-ready workforce for the future.