National Monday Update 30 March 2015

In Focus

Responsibility

We live in a troubled world.

Education of course is the pathway to everyone’s future. Year 12 completion plus a tertiary level qualification is a key to employability and improved earnings. This fact places enormous responsibility on all of us charged with developing policy, designing funding systems, delivering qualifications and regulating quality.

As I mentioned last week, if all of these elements don’t work together, the system can let down those relying on us.

This we just cannot allow – education is far too important.

I am forever amazed at the passion and quality of the many colleges I now visit, and of the real interaction with students. Of course, there are also some perverse outcomes in any fast growing system. These currently most appear in the VET FEE HELP program. The recent changes by both government and ACPET will make a difference. It is always pleasing to move in the right direction.

However, there is still work to do.

Each State and Territory has embarked on their own approach to Entitlement and contestability, with no apparent view to a national approach. In a modern economy where the labour market is national and international this approach is at best perplexing and at worst a failure of public policy.

This different approach to entitlement systems across the country has created even further complexity in a system that is already difficult to comprehend.

As States and Territories reduce their investment in VET, VET FEE HELP is growing rapidly.

This on first view looks fine. However, VET qualifications, which were once characterised by being too cheap (and therefore putting quality at risk), are now in many areas too expensive to get a real return on a student investment. How is it that students do not appear price sensitive?…Read more

National

	Scoping the Potential for a National Agents Quality Assurance System Edition 597, 30 Mar The International Education Association of Australia (IEAA), with support from the Australian Government Department of Education and Training, is undertaking a project to scope the potential for a national quality framework for Australia’s international education agents. The scoping research i… Read more
	4th UCEC Conference Edition 597, 30 Mar The University-Community Engagement Conference will be held on the Gold Coast from 1st-3rd November 2015. This conference will be the first UCEC held in Australia, which is co-hosted by the Australian College of Applied Psychology and Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) as part of the Asia-Pacific Univ… Read more
	The Unique Student Identifier – Get Connected Today! Edition 597, 30 Mar The USI was launched on 1 January this year, and is now a part of meeting VET data collection and reporting requirements. Over 1.5 million USIs have already been created, and most of Australia’s Training Organisations are now connected to the USI registry system, making it a part of their busi… Read more
	Funding Grants for Women in the Education Sector Edition 597, 30 Mar In 2015 Women & Leadership Australia is administering a national initiative to support the development of female leaders across all sectors. From March 2015 the initiative will provide women in the Education Sector with grants for leadership development. More specifically, grant app… Read more
	NCVER Survey on RTO role of RTOs in delivering programs for school leavers Edition 597, 30 Mar You’re invited to participate in an important survey on the role of private RTOs in delivering programs for 15 to 19 year old School Leavers. This research is funded by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER) and is being conducted by a team of researchers from the Brother… Read more
	This week in National professional development Edition 597, 30 Mar This week in professional development, we have a range of webinars from Moodle from scratch through to how to set up a successful partnership agreement. Check out what’s in store for the week: An introduction to the NVR Standards 2015 Implementing ACPET’s Revised Code of Ethics &… Read more
	Managing VET Reputation Edition 597, 30 Mar 22-24th April, 2015 – Radisson Blu, Sydney The dynamic and changing VET sector in Australia has been challenging for many RTOs. Organisations have had to reorder their priorities and rethink their strategic plan to be in-line with the changing landscape. The Managing VET Reputation Conferen… Read more
	Foundation Skills for RTOs: free professional development in 2015 Edition 597, 30 Mar Do I really understand the ACSF and CSfW frameworks? How do I apply them in my role? How do I help others in my RTO to apply them? RTO staff come from a wide range of industry backgrounds with varying levels of foundation skills knowledge. The Foundation Skills Frameworks provide common tools… Read more