VET & TAFE
campusreview.com.au
Common ground
Dual-sector universities call
for major reforms of higher
education and VET.
By Nicole Madigan
A
ustralia’s six dual-sector university
vice-chancellors have called for a
common policy framework and
major reforms to the fragmented higher
education and vocational training systems.
In their report, Reforming Post-Secondary
Education in Australia, they highlight
the need for changes to the Australian
Qualifications Framework, particularly to
support learner-centred pathways across
the continuum of AQF qualifications.
A common policy framework would
better meet the needs and opportunities
of Australia’s learners and workers in future,
the report says, as well as replace sectors
and institutions that have been historically
separated by policy, jurisdiction and tradition.
The report also calls for:
• modernisation of VET qualifications
so competencies focus on broad and
future skills requirements
• a coherent funding framework for
higher education and VET, spanning
the roles of the Commonwealth and
states and territories
• extension of work-based learning,
including apprenticeships, into new
industries and occupations in both
VET and higher education through
partnerships with firms, industries and
the labour movement.
“Australia’s current post-school education
system, encompassing vocational
education and training (VET) and higher
education, is fragmented, inflexible,
contains inequities and is not delivering
all that it could for current and future
students, business and our increasingly
complex society,” says Professor Simon
Maddocks, vice-chancellor of Charles
Darwin University.
“This fragmentation, coupled with two
rigid systems of accreditation, funding and
regulation differences between VET and
higher education, represent significant
impediments to Australia having an
agile, relevant and cost-effective tertiary
education sector.”
The common policy framework being
proposed by the six dual-sector universities
focuses on better meeting the future
needs of students, and better positioning
the tertiary education sector to respond
efficiently and effectively to the changing
needs in the labour market.
“A more coherent post-school education
system would include, for example, a
funding framework for tertiary education
that would extend HECS-type loans to VET
so that no students would be required to
pay upfront fees,” Maddocks says.
Modernising VET qualifications is also
central to a new, streamlined system so that
the competencies being taught mirror the
needs of employers, he says.
“Currently the VET competency model
focuses on narrow, prescribed occupational
tasks that have grown out of dated
workplace requirements.
“Increasingly, employers are calling for
VET graduates to have more generic skills,
such as thinking skills.
“Similarly, employers are calling for greater
and more sustained work-based learning
for higher education students, so they are
better prepared to join the workforce.
“A new integrated framework would allow
students to co-enrol in higher education
and VET without financial penalties.”
More than 10 years after the Bradley
Review of Higher Education proposed a
more coherent tertiary education system,
the new report says connections between
the vocational and higher education sectors
have in fact weakened due to increasingly
entrenched differences between systems of
governance, funding and regulation.
But Australia’s dual-sector institutions
are uniquely positioned to contribute
constructively to the next stages of this
shared agenda, the report says.
Using the unique experiences of
dual-sector universities to understand
Australia’s tertiary system, the report
features a range of case studies from each
university demonstrating collaboration
in qualifications design, delivery and
assessment requirements, accreditation
standards, system regulators’ approaches,
public funding, income-contingent loans,
and government accountability.
“This report highlights how Australia’s
fragmented higher education and
vocational training systems could each
be strengthened with a common policy
framework and a suite of major reforms
to post-secondary education,” says
Federation University vice-chancellor
and president Professor Helen Bartlett.
“This includes putting students at
the heart of the system by supporting
learner‑centred pathways across the
AQF, modernising VET qualifications so
that competencies focus on broad and
future skills requirements and ensuring
funding is better coordinated between the
Commonwealth, states and territories for
both higher education and TAFE.
“We also need to ensure students are
equipped with the skills they need for
the workforce by extending work-based
learning, including apprenticeships, into
new industries and occupations.
“Doing this across both VET and higher
education through partnerships with firms,
industries and the labour movement will
help make sure students are job-ready
when they graduate.
“The various initiatives outlined in this
report show what has been achieved by the
dual-sector institutions and suggest there are
even greater opportunities ahead if VET and
higher education were better connected.”
Australia has more than 4000 registered
training organisations that delivered VET
training to more than four million people
in 2017, while its 39 public universities (and
about 100 non-university higher education
providers) delivered courses to 1.5 million
domestic and international students.
The report was developed to contribute
to discussion about the future of Australian
post-secondary education.
“Why shouldn’t students have the
freedom to choose units from both higher
education and VET to ensure that they have
all the skills, knowledge and experience
they need to join the workforce after
graduation?” Maddocks says.
“Naturally, the benefits of more well-rounded
graduates would have flow-on benefits for the
quality of future postgraduate students.” ■
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