Industry-school partnerships: Boundary crossing to enable school to work transitions

Industry–school partnerships (ISPs) are increasingly being recognised as a new way of providing vocational education opportunities particularly in industries where there are skills shortages. However, there is limited research investigating their impact on school to work transitions. This paper reports on a government-led ISP, the Gateway to Industry Schools Program, established in Queensland, Australia. Central to this initiative is the Resources Academy, a lead organisation for 28 schools and 17 multinational sponsor companies. This research adopted a qualitative case study methodology and draws upon boundary crossing theory as means to understand a Minerals and Energy ISP. We distinguish four types of boundary crossing mechanisms, which partners navigate in ISPs. The main findings were that boundary crossing mechanisms assist ISPs to develop industry-based contextualised curriculum and to prepare school students for employment.