VDC NEWS

06 December 2023

Edition 23 - 2023

More insights on skills passports

We wrote a bit about skills passports in VDC News in October this year, arising – as it did – from the Employment White Paper. In that article we noted that while there might be positives about setting such a system up, a key issue was quality control of what the passport contains, especially if it was to contain non-formal education and other information that might be difficult to verify.

Just the other day, Craig Fowler, a former MD of NCVER, has given his insights on that topic in an article in Future Campus. He asks whether these passports are a game changer or just a new “e-cover on an old book”?

Employer support for VET training remains strong

The latest employer use and views survey has just been released by NCVER. It collected information from 6,290 employers between March and June 2023.

According to NCVER’s press release, the results tell us that “employers continue to engage with the accredited training system while increasing their use of unaccredited and informal training in 2023.” This biennial survey also “found that 56.8% of Australian employers engaged with at least one form of accredited training through the vocational education and training (VET) system in the last twelve months.” This was similar to the data collected in 2021, the last time the survey was conducted.

The OECD’s spotlight on VET in 2023

In this ‘at a glance’ publication from the OECD, they seek to spotlight VET’s role, particularly in upper secondary education.

It notes that:

“The organisation and structure of vocational education vary considerably from one country to another. Approaches range from not having a differentiated vocational track in initial upper secondary education at all, to having most students in upper secondary education pursuing vocational programmes often with the option to choose between several vocational tracks.”

Book celebrating the life and work of Peter Noonan just released

Rethinking Tertiary Education: Building on the work of Peter Noonan was recently released by Melbourne University Press. Edited by Peter Dawkins, Megan Lilly and Robert Pascoe it presents chapters on a range of issues that were close to Peter’s heart. Readers can purchase it in hard copy or in downloadable form.

The intent of the book is to “make a major contribution to the debate about the role that tertiary education needs to play in promoting Australia’s future economic prosperity and in enhancing social outcomes and greater equality of opportunity.”

Congratulations to the inaugural VDC Australian VET Sustainability Fellow

Last week, the inaugural recipient of the VDC Australian VET Sustainability Fellowship for Vocational Education & Training, Peter Schreiner, received his certificate during the International Specialised Skills Institute (ISSI) 2023 Awards Ceremony. VDC Project Director Sandra Ball (pictured) presented the award to Peter.

Peter’s research will focus on workforce development practices in energy storage technologies including lithium-ion and flow batteries. The intention is to learn from leading European cell manufacturing facilities and gain an understanding of the various occupational roles within these organisations to determine skills and knowledge required to support future production and storage of renewable energy in Australia. This Fellowship also proposes to acquire knowledge of the battery manufacturing supply chain.