2010/751 Seafood Industry Partners’ Project (SIPP) 2010 retreat: Connecting early career researchers with the Australian seafood industry through meaningful coaching partnerships: Year 2

By Mark Oliver and Emily Mantilla

The Seafood CRC's Education and Training Program has a strong end-user focus and needs to ensure "industry ready" graduates enter the Australian seafood industry at the completion of their candidature. The desire to develop the capabilities of both young researchers and industry participants is a strong and major driving force in the Seafood CRC. As such, research students and Post Doctoral Research Scientists (early career scientists) will be part of a program that enhances their pathway into further seafood research or industry careers. This program is called the Seafood Industry Partners Project (or SIPP) and usually takes the form of a yearly training "retreat".

The SIPP program in 2010 was held over two days at the Sea World Nara Resort on the Gold Coast due to close proximity to Gold Coast Marine Aquaculture. The retreat consisted of a welcome dinner, a tour of Shark Bay, workshops on effective communication and innovative/ entrepreneurial thinking and two-hour 'work experience' placements within the Gold Coast Marine Aquaculture facility. A total of 23 PhD students, one Masters by Research and four Post Doctoral Research Scientists as well as 10 industry mentors actively participated in SIPP 2010.

SIPP 2010 was concluded to be a successful initiative for early career scientist and industry training and encouraging a young scientist cohort with links to industry. It also achieved important connections with the Seafood CRC organisation and CRC staff.