Bringing together academics, politicians and educationalists, professional services firm Deloitte is hosting an education summit aiming to explore new ideas for Australia’s 42 universities and higher education facilities.

The summit, as part of the company’s professional development program, features a series of nationwide activities across Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide, Darwin, Hobart and Perth over two weeks.

Deloitte government services leader Rory O’Connor said now is an opportune time to discuss options for better education, backed by the Government’s $11 billion investment and parallel reviews of the Higher Education and Innovation sectors.

“We are hoping our people will come up with some real breakthrough thinking about how Australia can move this vital sector well into the 21st century and beyond,” Mr O’Connor said.

Acting NSW Education Minister John Hatzistergos and NSW Parliamentary Secretary for Education Virginia Judge have attended the summit’s Sydney session, which revolved around the theme of building education and opportunity in Indigenous Australia.

Also at the session were Dr Chris Sarra, a recent participant at Kevin Rudd’s 2020 Summit and Beau Leese, the initiator of the summit who gave the presentation on a joint project of Deloitte and the Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education in Northern Territory 

Chairman of the Deloitte Foundation John Azarias said: “The education summit is really engaging our people and testing their innovate thinking around an area they all know well – education – what works and what doesn’t, and where we could do better.”