Can VET and higher education get on better outside of the academy, asks John Mitchell. Almost every time the subject of collaboration between VET and higher education arises, the conversation gets tangled up in the differences between the two sectors, ...
More »Looking to the past to see the future
Talking a walk down memory lane, Robin Ryan says there might be nothing new under the sun, but Australian VET is on the cusp of significant change. Nothing reminds one of advancing age more than being asked to reflect on ...
More »TAFE can lift its game and deliver on its promise
Pam Christie recently took up one of the most senior positions in TAFE nationally, as deputy director-general, TAFE and community education, in the NSW Department of Education and Training. She spoke candidly to John Mitchell about whether TAFE was capabl ...
More »Cost and quality in Australian research
Is the Go8 really the best place to park Australia’s research budget, ask Roderick Duncan and Mark Morrison. Imagine you are a bureaucrat in Canberra deciding where to spend taxpayer dollars to boost research. Which universities should receive the extra ...
More »Letter to the editor
The Campus Review story on Carnegie Mellon University (03.05.10) was inaccurate and lacked important information about our role in South Australia. Just four short years ago, as part of a vision for building an education hub, the South Australian government ...
More »A modern morality play
Morality has tangled roots, millennia-deep, sourced in pre-Christian philosophers such as the ancient Greeks Socrates and Aristotle who wondered what we wonder still: What is justice? How should we act in any given situation? What are the consequences of our ...
More »Pyne’s education non-revolution
So where does the Liberal Party stand on higher education? Not too far from where it stood three years ago, writes Julie Hare. It’s an election year and the Opposition took the opportunity to expound its higher education policy at ...
More »Productivity possibilities
Teachers aren’t the only source of future efficiencies in VET, says John Mitchell. The recently announced review of the VET workforce by the Productivity Commission will be a critical research project with its focus on trainers and assessors. However, productivity ...
More »Getting apprentices over the hump: loans, tax credits?
Australia needs to think laterally, and explore what’s happening overseas, to find new ways of encouraging people to sign up for apprenticeships – and then stick with them. Income-contingent loans, tax rebates, tax credits, industry levies and even early access ...
More »Opportunity or opportunism?
The equity agenda is driving some interesting initiatives, but Sharon Bell wonders about the sincerity behind some of them. The second opening of the academy in Australia – a move from mass to universal entitlement to participation in higher education ...
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