From classroom to career: How Australia’s tech sector can build stronger education pathways

Diversity is a strength. It expands the tech talent pipeline and feeds a profession hungry for innovation and creativity. However, ACS Digital Pulse 2026 also highlights that Australia will need 259,000 additional technology workers by 2035. And while demand is rising, participation in technology education is declining. Too few students are developing advanced digital skills, too few can see themselves pursuing technology careers, and many teachers do not feel equipped to reverse the trend.

This raises an important question: where will Australia’s next generation of technology workers come from?

 

Why is student participation in technology education declining?

High School students are rejecting technology education, with both participation and proficiency in decline. In 2024, approximately 25% of Year 12 students participated in technology courses. In 2012, that figure was 36%.

Measures of digital proficiency tell a similarly concerning story. In the most recent National Assessment Program sample assessment of ICT literacy, only 37% of Year 10 students were assessed as digitally proficient.

Most concerning, a mere 11% of High School students say they intend to pursue an IT career.

These figures matter because Australia’s tech sector needs to expand the pool of highly skilled and diverse workers. That means reaching students who may enjoy solving problems, helping people or designing solutions, but who have never connected those interests with a career in technology.

Technology careers are still too often presented as a narrow set of highly technical roles for a narrow type of person. In reality, technology work extends across every industry and combines technical capability with creativity, collaboration, critical thinking and human judgement.

Students cannot aspire to careers they cannot see.

 

Why do schools matter to Australia’s technology workforce?

Interest in a technology career often begins long before someone applies for a job or chooses a university degree.

Almost half of Australia’s technology workers first became interested in the career while they were school-aged. Another 30% discovered that interest during tertiary education, while only 21% did so after entering the workforce.

That makes school a decisive point in the technology talent pipeline.

Teachers play a particularly influential role. More than half of workers report that a teacher encouraged them to pursue a particular career. Yet the importance of teachers is often overlooked when workforce shortages are discussed. 

For the technology community, teachers create a direct connection between what happens in schools and the profession’s future. If students do not encounter technology in engaging and meaningful ways, they are less likely to study it, understand the breadth of careers available, and become the people employers need.

Supporting teachers is, therefore, not just an education issue. It is a long-term workforce strategy.

 

What barriers prevent teachers from teaching digital skills effectively?

Teachers are being asked to prepare students for an increasingly digital and AI-enabled economy. Many, however, have not been given enough time, training, resources or practical support to do so confidently.

ACS is currently running the third national Digital Technologies Education Survey. First held in 2021, the survey is designed to understand how computing and digital skills are taught from Foundation to Year 12. 

Survey results have been published in two editions of the report: Tech Skills for the Next Generation. In 2024, the report highlighted that more than two-thirds of teachers struggled to implement the Digital Technologies Curriculum.

Of the teachers surveyed, 56% had no professional development in 12 months, and in certain states and territories that figure was even higher; in NSW it was 76%. Teachers who did receive professional development still felt under-supported, with 49% stating the support wasn’t adequate. Other barriers included competing demands on teachers’ time, lesson planning and access to resources.

In ACS Digital Pulse 2026, only half of the workers surveyed agreed that their teachers had possessed the digital knowledge and skills necessary to teach them effectively.

Teacher recruitment requirements suggest that capability is not yet being systematically developed. In 2025, digital skills appeared in only 11% of schoolteacher job advertisements. For tertiary educators, the proportion was higher but still only 22%.

This is not a story about teachers failing their students. It is a story about a system asking teachers to prepare young people for profound technological change without consistently providing the professional learning, industry connections and contemporary resources they need.

Teachers do not need to become AI engineers or cybersecurity experts. They need the confidence to show students how technology is used, the resources to engage students, and access to people who can bring the reality of technology careers into the classroom.

 

How can Australia improve digital education in schools? 

Teachers are central to the success of Digital Technologies education. They translate the curriculum into classroom experiences, shape students' attitudes towards technology and help young people develop the skills and confidence to use technology creatively and critically. Supporting teachers means strengthening digital education in Australia. 

The report Tech Skills for the Next Generation 2024 sets out 11 specific actions, organised under four overarching recommendation areas to support teachers and improve digital education in Australia’s schools.

1. Provide accessible, ready-to-use teaching resources

Teachers need practical, curriculum-aligned resources that reduce lesson-planning demands and help them translate Digital Technologies concepts into engaging classroom activities. The report recommends expanding and promoting the Digital Technologies Hub, regularly updating its teaching modules, and improving how schools distribute information about available resources. It also calls for stronger professional networks and communities of practice through which teachers can share proven lesson plans, expertise and classroom experiences.

2. Embed digital readiness in initial teacher education

Universities should prepare future teachers with the distinct capabilities required to teach with technology, use technology across learning areas, and teach the Digital Technologies Curriculum itself. The report recommends making these capabilities explicit within the accreditation of initial teacher education programs. This would give all new teachers, particularly primary and out-of-field teachers, a stronger foundation in digital literacy, computational thinking and technology teaching, reducing schools’ reliance on a small number of specialist educators.

3. Support ongoing professional development and training

Technology, and therefore the curriculum, change rapidly. This means teachers require regular opportunities to update their knowledge and practical skills. Governments should ensure suitable training is available, identify and promote trusted courses, and help teachers overcome the cost and time barriers that prevent participation. Professional development should cover curriculum changes, emerging technologies such as generative AI, relevant software and tools, and the practical conversion of curriculum objectives into effective lessons, activities and assessments.

4. Elevate community awareness of Digital Technologies Curriculum

Schools and governments should help parents, students and the wider community understand that Digital Technologies develops valuable problem-solving capabilities and opens pathways into many industries, not simply traditional ICT roles. The report recommends providing parents with inclusive information about learning and career outcomes, improving the visibility of underrepresented groups, collecting and communicating national data on student outcomes, and recognising excellent teaching. Stronger awareness would increase engagement, challenge misconceptions and elevate the subject’s status within schools and communities.

 

How can schools make technology careers more visible?

Young people are more likely to engage with technology when they can see what it enables them to do.

Game development, robotics, drones, virtual reality, AI and space technologies can make digital learning tangible, allowing students to create, experiment and solve recognisable problems. These industries also show that technology careers can draw on interests in art, design, storytelling, science, business and social impact, and not only coding.

Industry professionals play an important role in inspiring the next generation of tech talent. 

ACS Young Tech Ambassadors connects young technology professionals with secondary students through classroom presentations and career expos. Ambassadors share their personal career journeys, explain the variety of roles available and help demystify the transition from school into the technology workforce. The premise is simple: if students can see it, they can be it.

That visibility is especially important during subject-selection years, when a student’s perception of technology may determine whether they keep the door to a digital career open.

For ACS members and the wider technology community, participating in school engagement is more than volunteering. It is an opportunity to strengthen the future profession. The person who tells an honest, relatable story about their work today may inspire one of their organisation’s future hires.High School students are rejecting technology education, with both participation and proficiency in decline. In 2024, approximately 25% of Year 12 students participated in technology courses. In 2012, that figure was 36%.

 

What are the pathways into a technology career in Australia?

There is no longer one standard route into the technology workforce.

University education remains an important pathway. IT degree completions increased by 31% between 2023 and 2024, with international students making a particularly significant contribution — overseas commencements consistently exceeding domestic commencements.

VET (Vocational Education and Training) is also becoming more important. ICT-related VET enrolments rose strongly following the expansion of Fee-Free TAFE. 

Beyond university and VET, workers entered technology jobs through skilled migration, workplace training, industry credentials, and self-directed learning.

Around 74% of technology job advertisements still require a university degree. Yet more than half of workers who reskilled into technology entered through a non-university pathway. Two in five moved into a technology role within their existing organisation.

Around one in ten technology workers entered through a microcredential, while an estimated 34,000 self-starters without formal technology training joined the workforce over the five years, according to ACS Digital Pulse 2026.

The message is not that one pathway should replace another, but that Australia needs more high-quality pathways, and clearer connections between them.

 

How can education and industry create more credible career pathways?

A pathway becomes credible when students can understand where it leads, and employers can trust the capability it develops.

Universities and VET providers deliver essential knowledge and skills, but employers still see a gap between qualifications and workplace readiness. ACS Digital Pulse 2026 revealed that only around two-thirds of IT graduates work full-time in their field four to six months after completing their degree. It also found that 95% of surveyed employers perceive university and VET graduates as not being “job-ready”.

Closing this gap requires more opportunities for students to apply their learning through industry projects, mentoring, work-integrated learning, internships and exposure to contemporary workplaces.

The ACS ICT Gateway to Industry Schools Program demonstrates what this connection can look like. Delivered with the Queensland Government, the program helps secondary students and their parents navigate subject choices, training opportunities and pathways into ICT careers. To date, it has connected with more than 80 Queensland schools.

The program also supports educators through industry-led professional development, teaching resources and connections with technology employers and other ICT educators. Its focus areas, including cybersecurity, game development, robotics, mechatronics, AI and machine learning, help connect classroom learning with fields students can recognise, and employers increasingly need.

This kind of collaboration brings both sides of the pathway closer together. Teachers gain current industry knowledge. Students gain clearer career visibility. Employers help shape and strengthen their future talent pipeline.

Credible pathways begin with visibility. Students and career changers need to understand not only what technology jobs exist, but how education and training options connect to them. The Future Skills Organisation's Let's Get Digital campaign promotes greater awareness of digital careers and the pathways that lead to them, reflecting the reality that Australia's future technology workforce will be built through multiple pathways, not a single educational model.

 

What must Australia do next?

Australia needs an education-to-employment approach built around four priorities.

First, teachers need sustained professional learning, contemporary teaching resources and practical support to integrate digital capability across the curriculum.

Second, students need earlier and more consistent exposure to technology, through specialist electives but also through learning experiences that show how digital skills apply across industries and careers.

Third, education providers and employers must create more opportunities for students to translate knowledge into experience.

Finally, Australia must recognise multiple pathways into the profession while maintaining clear standards for capability, ethics and continuing development.

But good decisions require good evidence. Australia needs to understand how digital technologies are currently being taught, where teachers feel confident, where barriers remain and how emerging technologies such as AI are changing the classroom.

That is why ACS is asking Australian educators to contribute to the ACS Digital Technologies Education Survey 2026. The survey is currently open to educators involved in teaching, leading or supporting computing and digital technologies education in Australian schools. It explores curriculum delivery, teacher confidence and professional learning, access to resources, the effect of emerging technologies and the support educators need.

If you are an educator, your experience can help build the national evidence base for stronger digital education. Complete and share the ACS Digital Technologies Education Survey 2026 and help shape the support Australia’s teachers and students need.

The next generation of technology workers is sitting in Australia’s classrooms today. Building a pathway towards them is a responsibility we all share.

 

Download ACS Digital Pulse 2026.

This article highlights the need to support teachers and the expanding pathways into technology careers, as contained in ACS Digital Pulse 2026.

The full report explores Australia's technology workforce in far greater depth, with detailed analysis of AI adoption, workforce demand, productivity, economic contribution, digital inclusion and the skills that will shape the decade ahead.

Download the full report from the ACS Digital Pulse landing page and discover the evidence shaping Australia's digital future.