The success in attracting investment to Malta is attributed mainly to the quality of tertiary education graduates. It is important not to become complacent and to ensure that the University and MCAST continue to meet the needs of the country.
The content of our courses needs to take into account the competencies required for the services to be provided. Teaching programmes need to be co-ordinated so that they cover all the abilities required to deliver individual professional services. Simultaneously, the University has to ensure that its graduates have the necessary background capabilities to allow flexibility and quick adjournment pertaining to developments taking place from time to time.
Programmes need to include a focus on the practical application of knowledge and skills in the workplace. A number of our academics carry out research to develop these training materials and their work has been adopted by institutions in several other countries. These local professors are today considered to be leading-edge academics in their fields. There are a number of such examples at our university.
With the help of the technical projects carried out in the Engineering Faculty, students working under the direction of Dr Joseph Cilia, senior lecturer at the University, have introduced the electrical car in Malta and the electrical boat is already being researched. A prototype of the ideal electrical boat for Malta has already been finalised. Dr Mario Farrugia from the same faculty is leading a team developing a racing car.
In a different area, the book by Professor Lilian Azzopardi covering MCQs in Clinical Pharmacy published by the press of the royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, is considered as one of such tools enabling the testing of one's competencies. This is the third such publication following the great success of the previous two published in the past four years. The book carries a preface by the distinguished Emeritus Professor Charles Hepler, internationally recognised for his outstanding contribution to the development of pharmaceutical care.
The list of professors at our University who made a name for themselves and for the university is vast, as witnessed through the contributions to various international journals; a recent example is the publication by New Scientist of the research on auxetic materials carried out by Dr Joseph Grima, senior lecturer at the Chemistry Department and his team, which was featured earlier this year in the front page of this paper. It is important that practitioners keep affiliations with higher education institutes. Written and verbal communication skills underpin competence in many areas and should remain an integral part of competence assessment for our graduates.
There is an urgent need for the university to reach collaborative agreements with industry and service providers where our university provides a system of shadowing and coaching opportunities to individual students and also where the university provides assistance to the practitioners in developing innovative professional services. This is especially true for Malta since our success in industry and in provision of services lies with the development of small- and medium-sized enterprises.
Our graduates are excellent and many of them are of a young age. They will in all probability develop into top notch practitioners and some have already done so. This probability makes it all the more important for experienced and even developing academics to continue to extend support to fresh graduates who are giving a service to the community or industry now that they have gained experience in the real world. Such networks must be led by dynamic, motivated, expert academics. There is no room for complacency and there is need for zero tolerance to laissez-faire. It is equally important that due recognition is given to voluntary contributors to higher education by professionals working in the industry at least by the grant of an honorary title, if not financially.
The success of our young graduates has been underpinned by the developing career structures and integrated programmes of applied professional development in a supportive environment. It is imperative that post - graduate education replicates this development in industry and services (Professor Juanito Camilleri, Rector, has certainly first-hand experience in such an area when he developed Go Mobile, starting from ground zero). Substantial rapid reforms and development of post-graduate education is required to achieve the necessary change in the attitude of our graduates to the work environment.
Graduates need to be confident and competent to deliver services that meet the needs of the local situation. Supporting these graduates to reach their potential in the current competitive environment requires more than just traditional education and training activities. Robust assessment of competence and hands-on support in the workplace give new graduates the confidence to implement what they have learnt, and establish and maintain new services.
Unfortunately, current funding for these areas leave little room for diversity in meeting today's development needs to deliver locally commissioned services. However, such services must be developed as these are not only of great benefit in the local scene but may also be later exported to other developing countries; this is a 'modern' form of export, certainly environment friendly, and suitable to our little islands with few resources other than grey matter.