campusreview.com.au
University’s Mitchell Institute. Governments
have short-changed VET.
Three major issues beyond
VET FEE-HELP are: the alarming decrease
in apprenticeship commencements in the
last few years; the lax standards expected
of training providers, including that no
educator is required within a training
organisation; and the limited success of
regulators at ensuring consistent quality
training and assessment across the sector.
Each of these issues is partly a result of
VET policymakers’ infatuation with markets
and is challenging those policymakers
right now. Regarding the decrease in
apprenticeship commencements, in August,
John Buchanan and his colleagues from the
University of Sydney, in an NCVER report
on the support young apprentices need,
highlighted the weaknesses of the approach
to apprenticeships popular with policymakers
and employers: in the “restrictive workplace
learning situations, where virtually all training
takes place on the job and there is little time
for reflection, there is a preoccupation with
making the transition to full competence
arbitrarily quickly.” In other words, the
low-cost approach of mostly training
apprentices on the job, much loved by
policymakers, is backfiring.
Regarding the lax standards for training
providers, governments are always in catchup mode in trying to rid the system of
rogue operators; the federal government’s
Standards for RTOs (2015) do not require
providers to have on staff a person
responsible for education. The lack of an
educational leader contributes to the type
of debacle The Age reported on in August.
“More than 4000 Victorian students have
been forced to change courses following
an unprecedented crackdown on dodgy
training colleges,” the newspaper stated.
“The state government has terminated
the contracts of 18 providers, and is
set to recoup up to $50 million from
the scandal-plagued sector.” In-house
educators would have helped ensure
quality training was delivered.
Regarding the inability of regulators to
remove all rogue providers from the sector,
proof of such a failure is the unprecedented
entrance into the sector of the Australian
Competition and Consumer Commission
(ACCC), which took action against
providers such as Careers Australia, AIPE
and Empower Institute and has indicated
it is pursuing many others. Based on the
nature and scale of some of the ACCC
VET & TAFE
investigations, VET regulators are often out
of their depth.
IGNORANT, MISGUIDED,
DUPLICITOUS – IMMORAL, TOO
How can we explain the poor performance
by VET policymakers, particularly in the
last 8–10 years? Ignorant, misguided and
duplicitous acts have been cited as causes.
Laura Tingle’s recent Quarterly essay
suggests the ignorance evident in policy is
the result of a loss of institutional memory
within public service departments.
In interviews for Campus Review, Phillip
Toner from the University of Sydney
suggested that policymakers are misguided
in believing the creation of a market for VET
is as straightforward as developing a market
for selling potatoes.
Meanwhile, John Quiggin, from the
University of Queensland, suggests
governments are running out of money
and, in a somewhat duplicitous manner, are
dredging up zombie ideas such as markets
for VET to disguise their financial shortfalls.
Ignorant, misguided and duplicitous. But
as I might have asked during my history
studies, have the creators of the mess in
VET been immoral as well?
Given the large number of VET students
who have been exploited by unethical
providers as a consequence of slapdash
policymaking, despite policymakers being
challenged by a range of VET analysts and
journalists over the last five or six years,
it’s fair to question the morality of the
policymakers’ actions.
When I studied history, I focused on the use
of literature such as novels, plays and poetry
for insights and evidence. Taking on board
the massive exploitation of prospective or
enrolled students, I suggest the recent history
of VET could be more effectively captured in
a novel or a play than in a dry textbook. There
are Shakespearean elements. A novel about
VET’s recent history could describe fictional
characters who helped create the mess in
VET and explore whether their behaviour
was immoral. The novel could then be made
into a film, for consideration by a wide range
of Australians. Let them decide whether
policymakers were and are immoral.
The list of characters in the story
could include the following: egotistical,
ambitious public servants who, in looking
for promotion, persuaded their ministers
that sufficient safeguards for prospective
students were in place to launch a bold,
new market for VET funding, a market
open to provide