Central Queensland University will be partnered with 7 other Australian universities to develop a new program to promote and develop quality university teachers for the new millennium, through a Carrick-funded project.

The program will be conducted across the participating universities from 2009.

The program will consist of 4 courses of which each university has a core course and one other and co-teaches with the other participating universities for the other 2 courses.  Students will be able to enrol in the electives from other participating universities.

CQU representative for the project Leone Hinton said CQU stood to benefit greatly from the collaboration, particularly in benchmarking and improving standards in its new Graduate Certificate of Tertiary Education with the other 7 universities.

The project involves CQU along with the University of New England, Newcastle, Canberra, Flinders, Ballarat, Edith Cowan and Murdoch.

"Participants from the 8 universities will experience being students in all these universities," Ms Hinton explained.

"Significant to this program is that students will be in a community of practice where the benefits are sharing and collaborating on assessment projects and discussions relevant to working in tertiary institutions in Australia.

"The program will be established and implemented utilising an evidence-based approach and technology will feature heavily in the delivery of the program."

The outcome of such a program will mean that this award will be recognized between all participating institutions.

Students will experience a quality program with enough flexibility to meet the dynamic roles that academics face in today's higher education environment.

The project, which attracted $219,590 grant funding from the Carrick Institute's 2007 grants scheme priority projects program, will deliver a number of practical outcomes over the next 2 years.