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Speech
PREPARING YOUTH FOR THE 21ST CENTURY: THE POLICY LESSONS FROM THE PAST TWO DECADESBy The Hon. Dr David Kemp MP - Minister for Education, Training and Youth Affairs WASHINGTON, D.C., 23-24 FEBRUARY 1999 'AN AUSTRALIAN PERSPECTIVE’ by Dr David Kemp Australian Minister for Education, Training and Youth Affairs
INTRODUCTION I am very pleased to be here today on behalf of the Australian government and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the OECD and the US Departments of Labor and Education for organising this conference. The preparation of young people to engage actively and productively in social, economic and political life is one of the most vital tasks that any society must undertake. In addressing the issues of youth we are, in reality, talking about the future of our societies. The youth of today will have charge of and responsibility for our countries in the not too distant future, and the challenge for us is to make sure that the institutions and laws we leave to them when we depart give them the best possible chance of succeeding in achieving their aspirations in a world of dramatic change. Events such as this provide a useful and important opportunity to share experiences, learn from the past and reflect on the policies needed for the future. I have learnt much during the course of our discussions and welcome the opportunity to present an Australian perspective on the theme of preparing youth for the 21st century. At the outset I want to reaffirm that our democratic values demand that our policies acknowledge the needs of all young people to make a successful transition from school to work, from adolescence to adulthood. Many of the papers at this conference have identified the fact that while many young people in our societies find the transition difficult, there is a small group of very disadvantaged young people who find it all but impossible. The challenge for us as policy-makers is to put in place policies, which will meet the needs not only of the majority of young people, but of those most at risk. Australian policy has sought to address both these issues through a range of innovative approaches.
Values, Attitudes and Institutional Reform A major theme of this paper is that effective policies to secure the successful transition to adulthood of the coming generation not only must provide young people with the knowledge and skills which will be needed to function in the global knowledge economy of the 21st century, but also strengthen the values which will empower these young people to master the remarkable opportunities which this world will provide, and to do so in ways which will strengthen the foundations of a genuinely democratic society. As we learn more and more about how our societies work and the impact of different policies on those societies, we have come to recognise the intimate connection between the institutions we put in place, and the attitudes and culture which they generate. As we acknowledge the qualities that will be necessary to adapt to change in a global environment we are inevitably pushed towards institutional reform. In constructing our policies and the institutions to carry them out, we have a choice whether to encourage the values and attitudes which will fit the coming generation to take charge of their own future and master its challenges, or whether to ignore or leave in place policy frameworks which, we are learning, undermine this capacity. In Australia we have seen it important to emphasise values of adaptability and entrepreneurship, civic mindedness and a recognition of our mutual obligations within a community, leadership and a willingness to take personal responsibility for our decisions and actions. Conversely, it would be damaging for the future of our youth if they were to grow up imbibing an attitude of welfare dependence, immersed in a culture of blame and victimhood, or inheriting a conservatism resistant to innovation. In Australia as in a number of other countries, we have concluded that the institutions and ideology of the aging welfare state inherited from the post World War II era, as it impinges on young people, can breed or reinforce such attitudes. Our responsibilities to our young people mean that we must proceed with all deliberate speed to make sure that the incentives and arrangements in place to:
I see our youth policies as part of a larger context of policy reform. I think of that context as the renovation and reconstruction of the liberal democratic state now that the Cold War is in the dustbin of history. The end of the Cold War following the collapse of socialism has freed us from many of the public policy myths prevalent for many decades, and we are now looking with unprecedented clarity, I believe, at the capacities and limitations of traditional governmental activities in achieving a better functioning democratic society. The centralised welfare state based on bureaucratic provision of services has now been recognised in many countries as not merely an inefficient and wasteful way of providing for those who need assistance, but arranged around incentives where service to the client was often the lowest of priorities. Too often this welfare state was disempowering and alienating in its scale and remoteness from the ordinary person. The reconstruction which is now occurring is powered by the desire of people for more respect and responsiveness from their governments, for more control over their own lives and incomes and for a better standard of life. It is also being forced by the need for our societies to be capable of dynamic and adaptive change in the face of the uncertainties of the global economy and the technological revolutions which are under way. The importance of the values and attitudes generated by our institutional and policy frameworks lies not only in their impact on our capacity to seize the employment -creating opportunities of this new era. It is very clear in Australian research that the reluctance of many employers to hire young people is driven as much by their perceptions of the attitudes and values of the coming generation as it by a perception of lack of basic skills. Research indicates that in addition to good literacy and numeracy skills, employers value communication skills, maturity, willingness to learn, good presentation and work habits, stability and reliability, the ability to work in a team, and loyalty to the firm. Employers frequently complain that young people have learnt little in school which gives them an understanding of what it means to work regular hours in a business enterprise. Employers have indicated that they are less likely to consider young people who do not possess these basic personal attributes. It is obvious that since young people will not move into jobs unless employers are willing to hire them, and that high levels of youth unemployment will not be eliminated until young people are as attractive to employers as older workers, an effective strategy to address youth unemployment must address both the perceptions of employers and the realities (such as they may be) which give rise to these perceptions. Our conclusion has been that such a strategy cannot avoid the issue of institutional reform, both on the side of education and training as on the side of government welfare and service provision. Monolithic bureaucratic institutions create bureaucratic attitudes and process driven responses. Entrepreneurial institutions create entrepreneurial attitudes. In the global economy, and the global society to which it is giving rise, an entrepreneurial culture is a key to ensuring that new technologies and market opportunities lead to the new enterprises and the new jobs which our young people will need. It is the enterprising countries that will best secure the prosperity of their people.
Preparing For Prosperity There is little doubt that the nations which will succeed in the 21st century will be ‘knowledge societies’ – societies rich in human capital, effective in their capacity to utilise and deploy their human resources productively and successful in the creation and commercialisation of new knowledge. In such a world there will need to be greater opportunities than ever before for lifelong learning – for preparation not just for the first job but for succeeding jobs. If any one word characterises the focus of Australian education policies in the 1980s and 1990s it would be ‘access’. Australian governments invested considerable effort and resources in encouraging young people to remain at school to complete a full secondary education and also in the expansion of opportunities to engage in post-secondary education, particularly higher education. The effects of such policies can be seen dramatically from the following statistics:
A young Australian has something approaching a 45% percent chance of entering higher education by the time he or she has reached the age of 35 and over 80% chance of entering some form of post secondary education and training by that age. Australia is by no means unique in this. Similar levels of access would be found in many OECD countries. I refer you to the recent OECD publication Education at a Glance where lifetime chances of entering higher education are calculated to be at least 40% for young people in at least four other OECD countries. I think it is true to state that Australia has entered the age of mass participation in education and training. Young people in Australia enjoy unprecedented levels of access to postsecondary education and training and represent the best educated generation in our history. This increase in participation in education and training was matched by, and was in part a response to, a sharp decline in opportunities for full-time youth employment, as the economy restructured towards industries requiring a higher level of skills than many young people could provide. It is also true that increased retention at school has delayed the age at which many young people commence full-time employment, reducing the wage differential between older and younger employees. If the additional years at school do not significantly enhance the employability of young people, this effect would reduce the competitiveness of young people in the labour market. Young people, who have left school early, or with a record of low achievement, often have other problems which have contributed to their difficulty at school. These problems, which may include homelessness, learning disabilities, and family problems are likely to cause ongoing difficulties in their search for work. An effective policy strategy to assist these young people to continue with their education and training must take these difficulties into account. In August 1984, some 432,100 Australian teenagers (33.7% of the teenage population) were in full-time employment. Almost fifteen years later, in January 1999, some 223,400 Australian teenagers (17.0% of the teenage population) were in full-time employment. In the recession of the early 1990’s, the unemployment rate of teenagers looking for full time work rose to over 30 per cent, but has declined to 24.1 per cent in January 1999 The full time unemployed now account for 5.4 per cent 15-19 age cohort. One obvious conclusion which we drew from this decrease in employment opportunities for less skilled youth was that it was imperative to lift the skill levels of young people to the levels required by the burgeoning enterprises based on high technology. Among the most disadvantaged it became apparent that a common and fundamental problem was the lack of adequate literacy and numeracy skills. There is a strong link, for example, between school achievement in reading comprehension and mathematics in the middle school years (around 14 years of age) and labour market outcomes, even controlling for years of schooling completed. The higher the achievement in mathematics, the less likely that the young person will suffer extended unemployment. The same is true for reading comprehension, except that performance above the average appears to be not so beneficial as in the case of mathematics. Until national information regarding the performance of school students in key areas like literacy and numeracy had not been gathered for almost two decades. When the available data on a sample of 14 year olds was analysed, it was shown that there had been no improvement in literacy levels over the past two decades. A subsequent national survey of primary school students showed that as many as one third were having difficulty acquiring adequate literacy skills. Participation alone, however, is not enough. The key point is that Australians must enjoy not only access to education and training, but access to a quality education. Quality here means education which embodies the standards and strengthens the attitudes and values which our young people will need to take best advantage of the opportunities which are opening up, and which will minimise the risk of them falling into long-term unemployment. Despite the expansion of education and training opportunities there remains a group of young people who for one reason or another fail to make a successful transition from youth to a productive engagement in society as adults. There is evidence from longitudinal studies that up to 15-20 percent of Australian school leavers experience sustained difficulties in entering full-time employment after leaving school. A recent analysis tracking the experience of school leavers from the late 1980s over a seven year period showed that approximately 5 per cent of young people were engaged in mainly part-time work across the first seven post-school years. A further 7 per cent were mainly unemployed during their transition from school. There was a further group of school leavers (some 7%) who were mainly not in the labour force and not in study from the time of leaving school. Pathways of school leavers measured over the first seven post-school years (source ACER) The reasons for this phenomenon are complex. They include technological change and changes to work organisation, which have reduced demand for unskilled labour. Rigid industrial relations arrangements had disadvantaged many young people. A social security system, which did not provide strong incentives to reduce dependency also made a contribution. For a variety of reasons, the transition from youth to adulthood will be a difficult period for some young people. While the goal should be to prevent young people from prematurely disengaging from activities such as education and training which provide longer-term benefits, appropriate assistance must be available to support young people who have left education and training and are engaged in marginal activities, and to reinforce their links with society.
Policy Strategy A major message of The OECD Jobs Study was that any serious assault on the unemployment problem must be multi-facetted, dealing in a simultaneous and coordinated fashion with the many different strands of public policy which bear on the performance of the labour market. The Australian government has heard and heeded this message and accordingly designed a coherent set of policies designed, among other things, to encourage economic growth, reform the labour market to increase its flexibility, as well as improve the performance of education and training systems and reform social security arrangements. In relation to education and training we have adopted a policy strategy with a number of elements designed to address both deficiencies and to heighten key values:
Let me now elaborate on the principal ways in which we have sought to implement this strategy.
Facilitating choice Australia’s education and training systems are emerging from a period in which they were responsive primarily to funding bodies. The Australian government is working in a number of areas to ensure that education and training systems are responsive to the needs of their students and other stakeholders such as parents and employers. This involves a number of elements including increased user charging, the provision of information on performance to assist choice and a greater role for market mechanisms in the allocation of resources. The framework of school funding is encouraging parents at all income levels to actively choose the school which they believe will best meet the needs of their children. The fact that some 30 per cent of students are now in non-government schools is providing a healthy pressure for reform of the government sector of schooling. As a consequence, the previously centralised authority of large statewide bureaucratic school systems is increasingly being devolved, but within a framework of heightened accountability for educational standards An enterprise-friendly national framework of training qualifications has been put in place, with the public funding component being allocated according to the choices employers make between public and private training providers under a system known as "user –choice". An Australian Qualifications Framework, a national recognition framework for training providers, and competency-based training packages being developed by each industry sector within this framework, are key to the development of alternative pathways and quality vocational training. The flexible New Apprenticeship system is built on the foundations provided by this training framework. The university sector is increasingly being required to respond to student choices as they compete for students and the public and private funds students bring. Australian students in public universities now bear something approaching a third of the estimated cost of their courses. There is evidence that the fact that students are contributing towards the cost of their tuition is making them more aware as consumers and more demanding of the institutions providing their education. This restructuring of our education and training institutions aims to ensure that they provide an enterprising and entrepreneurial environment for the education of the next generation.
Accountability for Standards Students, families and others such as employers cannot make informed choices unless they have access to relevant and accurate information. The government is working across all sectors to increase the availability of information about the provision and performance of educational providers. A national literacy standard has been set in place, to be followed this year by national numeracy standards. Australian State Education Ministers have also agreed to a National Plan for teachers to assess all students entering primary school and to deliver early intervention for those having problems. In 1998 students in all States were assessed in years 3 and 5 against the literacy standard for the first time. We are also seeking specific performance targets for science, vocational education and other national goals of schooling. In higher education from 1998 onwards, publicly funded institutions are required, as part of their strategic planning process, to provide quality assurance and improvement plans which include the institution's own assessment of its quality outcomes based on appropriate and robust indicators. These include a core of graduate and employer satisfaction indicators as well as indicators specific to the institution. This process is being supplemented by regular publication of the Commonwealth's sector-wide higher education efficiency and effectiveness indicators which will provide a consistent set of indicators for all institutions and provide publicly available information which can, among other things, help guide students in their choice of institution.
Broadening the Secondary curriculum Schools in Australia adjusted only slowly to the growth in the numbers of students staying on to the final secondary years. The senior curriculum remained dominated by the needs of the 30 per cent of students intending to undertake academically oriented tertiary studies. Many young people encountered a curriculum of doubtful relevance to their needs, and aspirations and, as a consequence, did not gain as much as they could from participation in the post-compulsory years of schooling. The needs of the 70 per cent of students not going from school to university required an alternative and equally clear pathway. As a consequence a great deal of attention is being given to mechanisms which can bring educational institutions and business enterprises into productive partnerships in education and training. An isolation between schools and the world of work which had grown up over decades is being broken down by, for example, the development of courses in which schools and business enterprises act as partners to deliver training and qualifications. Special programmes of enterprise education are being developed and the New Apprenticeship system is being extended into schools on the basis of the delivery of the industry standards required by the national training framework. Numbers in school/industry vocational education programmes in schools have risen from 26,000 in 1995 to 114,000 in 1998. School-based apprenticeships are now possible, and schools are currently trialling a range of models. In addition, schools have been invited to become proactive in seeking out employment opportunities as brokers for their school leavers, and over half of Australia’s high schools are now active participants in this program. This initiative is promoting significant cultural change within schools in the form of a greatly broadened sense of the responsibility of schools to their students. To students it is giving a message that schools, which to many seemed irrelevant to their later opportunities, are now seen as very relevant indeed. Collaborative work between business and universities is being encouraged in a variety of ways, and we are currently looking at ways to foster a more entrepreneurial culture among our researchers to hasten the establishment of spin-off enterprises.
Incentives In order to ensure that the financial barriers to educational participation faced by low income families are minimised, Australia has had a system of targeted education income support payments for low income families and young people since the mid 1970s. By international comparison, Australia had developed welfare benefit arrangements which were increasingly recognised as having perverse incentives - encouraging young people (who are at risk or "marginal") to drop out of school by the too early provision of unemployment benefit and, because of the comparative levels of income support available some preferred unemployment to education and training. These arrangements were supported by a growing culture of entitlement, which more and more was seen to be encouraging a damaging culture of welfare dependence. As a consequence major changes have been made to the way in which welfare incentives have been organised for young people, and indeed in the way in which the government meets its obligation to unemployed people, including the young. Income support has now been abolished for young people up to the age of 17 if they voluntarily abandon education or training; under a unified Youth Allowance income support for needy students and for unemployed young people 18-24 has been equalised to remove disincentives to study. These changes to youth income support in Australia have been designed to provide a clear incentive for young people to remain in education and training rather than enter a labour market for which they are ill-equipped or unprepared. The policy framework now gives young people the explicit message that it is important that they invest their time and energies in acquiring the education and skills which they will need in the more technological and knowledge based economy of the future. Australia also offers specific support to its Indigenous young people and the Government is determined to make further progress in providing access to education to this group. In the area of income support, the Government has sought to align benefits for Australia’s indigenous and non-indigenous citizens but has recognised the need for additional targeted support reflecting their special circumstances and needs.
Career information and services In the past, Australia has paid relatively little attention at the national level to the provision of career information and services. Australia continues to experience unacceptably high drop-out rates from further education and training, including university, apprenticeships and traineeships. While there are many factors contributing to drop-out rates, it is fair to assume that ill-informed decision-making is a factor in a significant number of cases. The federal government is currently working with the States to develop initiatives for improved career information for students.
Labour market assistance The philosophical basis of the provision of social security and ‘welfare’ is being rethought throughout most of the English speaking nations in the developed world. Australia is no exception. The context and thrust of welfare reform differs between nations, depending upon the nature and roles of social security and unemployment benefit systems. In Australia, support for the young unemployed is now provided within a framework known as ‘mutual obligation’. The basic idea behind the concept of mutual obligation is that while the Government has an obligation to assist young people who cannot find work, those young people receiving assistance also have obligations to society - to undertake activity designed to improve their chances of gaining economic independence or to contribute to the community Under the principle of ‘mutual obligation’, young unemployed people receiving long-term income support are required to undertake activities designed to increase their levels of economic and social participation. Specifically, 18-24 year olds on income support for six months or more, must participate in one of a menu of alternatives which includes work experience, voluntary work, part-time work or literacy and numeracy training. The most comprehensive use of market mechanisms to improve service and performance has occurred with Australia’s reforms to labour market assistance. This involved the competitive contracting out of job matching services formerly undertaken by the public employment service to private and community agencies as well as a corporatised public employment agency, known as the Job Network. In addition, the delivery of labour market assistance to unemployed Australians was allocated on the basis of competitive tender and restrictions were removed which fettered the capacity of providers to tailor their services to meet the needs of the individual. Already there has been a dramatic improvement in linking unemployed people to employers and in the erosion of welfare dependence.
Industrial Relations Industrial relations reform is an important component of the Australian government’s overall approach to creating the conditions for sustained economic and employment growth. The protection of the competitive position of young people in the labour market and the promotion of youth employment is a specific concern of the Government. The wages of young people relative to those of adults are a factor in determining the level of youth employment. Research conducted by Australia’s Productivity Commission indicates a ‘strong and robust’ negative relationship between youth employment and youth wages in Australia. Australia has a junior wage system, which protects the interests of young people in the labour market, exempting junior rates of pay from existing provisions intended to eliminate age discrimination. Reflecting the evidence that an increase in youth wages relative to those of adults would have a negative impact on youth employment, the Australian Government is committed to maintaining the scope for employers to set age-based wages for young people.
The Positive Engagement of Youth The preparation of youth for the 21st century must been seen as a holistic process encompassing preparation for citizenship as well as participation in the economy and civil society. What message are we in government attempting to give back to young people about how their role and importance is seen by their society? The policies I have just mentioned are certainly giving a message that the generations who presently lead the institutions of government care about what happens to the coming generation. They are policies based on a great faith in the coming generation if appropriate incentives and opportunities are put in place. While there are young people who protest at the changing attitude to, say, income support, I venture to say there are many more who acknowledge the fairness of the new approach. There are certainly many who have experienced the mutual obligation policies who are loud in their praises for the impact of this new framework on their attitudes and opportunities. We have also taken the view that too often the public image of young people is negative, and that this has got to the point where it is affecting employment opportunities. Some of the policy initiatives of the last few years are designed to highlight to young people and to the wider community the remarkable qualities and achievements of the coming generation. Events such as the Young Australian of the Year and the National Youth Media Awards have this purpose, as does the newly initiated National Youth Roundtable, to which all young Australians 15-24 are entitled to nominate. The Roundtable is intended to be a high profile event in which 50 selected young Australians come to the national capital to advise government on the perspectives of young people on the range of key issues they face. They will meet with senior ministers and initiate an agenda, which they will pursue with other young people when they return to their communities. Complementing this initiative, the government has actively promoted civics education in schools with the aim of instilling an understanding and appreciation of the Australian democratic tradition in the young. Those of us entrusted with responsibility for policies to bring the next generation successfully through to adulthood have a challenging but rewarding task. This coming generation will have the opportunity to bring the world closer than it has ever been before to securing the dignity of all people within democratic political systems and free and productive economies. I believe this is what young people hope for themselves when they reflect positively on the future. If we have in mind that our policy initiatives must address the needs of all young people, and must provide not merely knowledge and skills, but the attitudes and values which will ensure that knowledge and skills are used wisely, we will not regret our work as the years pass.
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