Is it possible for training providers to craft effective strategies amid the current economic turbulence, asks John Mitchell. Chief executives of training providers broadly agree that this is the most tumultuous period VET has ever experienced. Typically they point out ...

Australia won’t fix its skills system by simply throwing lots of money at it, according to an alliance of unions, business and specialist training organisations which has called for VET providers to be funded more realistically. The National Skills Policy ...

Applications open for VET infrastructure grants Applications from public sector and large community VET providers for funding under the $200 million Training Infrastructure Investment for Tomorrow (TIIT) program are now open. While consortia of industry and community bodies can be ...

Australian higher education and the world: has the Bradley report got it right, asks Simon Marginson. Are we optimising the global position of Australian higher education? International students are now 26 per cent of all Australian universities students, 20 per ...

Funding arrangements for the Productivity Places Program (PPP) have given rise to “a perverse set of delivery arrangements”, a senior bureaucrat told this month’s Australian Vocational Education and Training Research Association conference.

We need more deeply understand the complexity of different student contexts and how they play out in modern, tertiary institutions, says Liz Harman. The government focus on students is welcome. In her speech at the Universities Australia Conference on 4 ...

A senior Canberra bureaucrat has conceded that more research may be needed to justify proposed market-based reforms of Australia’s skills system. But rather than complain about “evidence-free policy”, VET commentators should themselves compile research in the area. Craig Robertson, group ...

Will improved broadband do more than simply let VET providers share larger files with their students, asks John Mitchell. The unexpected announcement that the federal government will invest $43 billion in rolling out a broadband network over the next eight ...

VET’s uniqueness of purposes seems to be getting lost in the current debate about a terntiary education sector, says Malcolm White. In my opinion, the current discussion about the roles of VET and higher education emanating from the Bradley review ...

Reflection is both a starting point and a tipping point for improving self-perception, and in turn, the nature and quality of vocational learning, says Larry Smith. During 2008, Berwyn Clayton from Victoria University and I interviewed a wide range of ...