Bright futures - Monash Engineering granted 88 extra undergraduate places to bolster workforce capacity

Thanks to 88 additional undergraduate study places provided by the Federal Government, Monash Engineering has now bolstered its capacity to train the extra engineers needed to strengthen Australia’s engineering workforce, and contribute to the nation’s post-COVID recovery over the long term.

Engineers drive economic growth by designing almost every product and system we use and depend on, and are needed to deliver the technologies that our cities, industries and populations require - ever more urgently so in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing ecological crisis affecting the planet.

As one of Australia’s leading engineering schools, ranked in the top 100 Engineering schools globally and celebrating its 60th anniversary in 2021, Monash Engineering is ideally placed to train and equip these additional undergraduate students with the skills required to drive economic growth and innovation into the future.

The additional places are also positive step forward in addressing the declining supply of engineers into our workforce across all three major intake channels (temporary and permanent migration and domestic engineering education completions) identified in the latest figures from Engineers Australia, and mitigates some of the risk of Australia’s overall overdependence on skilled migration to fill workforce shortages. Given the unprecedented uncertainty surrounding international travel and COVID-19 transmission risk, there has never been a more critical time to secure our domestic supply of engineers.

Graduate engineers continue to enjoy high employment outcomes and starting salaries, and Monash Engineering students in particular benefit from our world-class, accredited engineering education with the added competitive edge of participation in our Co-operative Education Program and high-performing student teams, such as global #1 Formula Student team Monash Motorsport, or the Monash Nova Rover team, currently competing to win up to $225,000 of NASA funding to develop their unique payload design to send on a future mission to the moon.

Dean of Engineering Professor Elizabeth Croft welcomed the additional investment into engineering education by the Federal Government. “We are delighted to receive an extra 88 places for our domestic undergraduate 2021 cohort,” she said. “In the context of the global pandemic and the ongoing challenges of climate change, we are proud to be making such a vital contribution to strengthening Australia’s future capabilities and securing our economic future through the innovation, creativity and commitment of our home-grown engineers.”