This issue includes a special section devoted to the Commonwealth Budget which was brought down on Tuesday 13 May. The articles included under this section are:
The Commonwealth Budget was brought down at 7.30pm on Tuesday 13 May 2003. For your information, go to the Commonwealth Department of Education, Science and Training Budget site.
This site provides Budget information specific to the portfolio, including ministerial media releases and the portfolio budget statements. A link to the complete Commonwealth Budget information is also attached to this site.
In addition to the link above readers of "Training Talk" may be interested in the following articles:
Increased Commonwealth Funding Australian National Training Authority (ANTA) Agreement, 2004-2006
The Minister for Education, Science and Training, the Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson MP announced an offer of additional funding of around $220 million to States and Territories under the new Australian National Training Authority (ANTA) Agreement for 2004 -2006. This Agreement is the mechanism for contributing Commonwealth funds into the national vocational education and training (VET) system. Commonwealth funding will now rise to around $3.6 billion over the term of the Agreement. The States are being asked to match the growth funding element at the 2003 level including indexation ($325.5 million over three years) and to match the $119 million over three years being offered by the Commonwealth to reflect growth priorities in the areas of extra training places and better outcomes for people with a disability, mature age workers and other priority groups.
More than 1.7 million students or about 13% of the working age population take part in vocational education and training each year. Participation by Indigenous Australians has increased by 122% since 1995, while the rate for those in rural and remote areas rose by 49% during the same time period. The uptake of New Apprenticeships has also jumped significantly, with numbers more than doubling since 1995.
Greater opportunities are now available for younger people wishing to enrol in VET. Through the VET in schools programmes and school-based New Apprenticeships, a young person can start a New Apprenticeship whilst at school. Today, there are almost 170,000 students studying VET subjects and 5,800 undertaking New Apprenticeships as a part of their secondary schooling.
The three year funding agreement will build on current collaborative working relationships to address skill shortages and to enhance the quality of training provided. Other priorities areas to be advanced under the New Agreement include: improving national consistency; maintaining an open and competitive training market; and increasing flexibility and innovation in the system.
The Commonwealth will also seek to ensure that funding is better targeted to areas of national significance, such as welfare reform, workplace reform, regional development, lifelong learning, youth transitions and practical reconciliation for Indigenous Australians. The Commonwealth’s offer to the States and Territories demonstrates the Government’s ongoing commitment to high quality vocational education and training which provides individuals and industry with qualifications they can rely on.
Details of the Commonwealth’s offer were provided to States and Territories on Budget Night.
For more information see www.dest.gov.au/ministers/nelson/budget03/bud33_130503.htm 
ECEF Moves Into DEST
The Commonwealth Government has announced in the Federal Budget that the functions of the Enterprise and Career Education Foundation (ECEF) will be brought into the Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST). This move will more strongly integrate the Commonwealth’s initiatives relating to careers and transitions with its priorities across portfolios. It will also produce efficiencies in terms of the administration of Commonwealth programmes.
ECEF was established by the Commonwealth in January 2001 to build on the work of the Australian Student Traineeship Foundation (ASTF). In that time, the national network of school, industry and community clusters has grown to more than 200 clusters nationally, and in 2002 almost 80,000 work placements were found for school students under the Commonwealth’s Structured Workplace Learning (SWL) programme.
Over the coming months, the management of the SWL programme will be transferred to the Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST).
Other functions carried out by ECEF, including its advisory capacity and management of a range of other initiatives and programmes, will also be transferred to DEST during a transition period to 30 September 2003. Organisations that have been working with ECEF will notice very little change other than the management of contracts being simply transferred to DEST. ECEF will cease to operate on 30 September 2003.
This rationalisation of the Commonwealth’s effort in career and transitions programme management and policy advice will result in reduced potential for overlap and provide a more consistent and holistic approach in supporting young people in their transition through school and from school to further education, training and work.
The Minister for Education, Science and Training, the Hon Dr Brendan Nelson MP, has recognised the good work done by ECEF in the area of careers and transitions. You can find the Minister’s press release at: www.dest.gov.au/ministers/nelson/budget03/bud33_130503.htm
More information, including Questions & Answers, is also available at the DEST website: http://www.dest.gov.au/ecef or you can email your enquiry to: ecefinfo@dest.gov.au or telephone (02) 6240 8608.
Australian businesses now have a one-stop web entry point for information on vocational education and training (VET).
training.com.au allows users to quickly and easily find VET information, products, services, and organisations.
The catalyst for training.com.au was the need to simplify access to VET for clients and make it easier for them to navigate Australia’s national training system.
It contains practical information on topics such as New Apprenticeships, training costs, how to upskill staff and how to cultivate a learning culture. In addition, it will provide a doorway to the many web sites and e-business facilities related to nationally recognised training in Australia.
The site features a variety of case studies, frequently asked questions and training options to assist businesses assess their training needs.
A seamless entry point
The Australian National Training Authority (ANTA), together with a steering committee of senior officers from the Commonwealth, States and Territories and industry, has spent the last 18 months working to make training.com.au a reality.
The first step was to hold focus groups to identify the information clients want to know about training in Australia. Extensive testing with users and stakeholders followed, before a pre-launch testing commenced in March.
ANTA’s Lesley Johnson, director of business management, said the response to the portal had been enthusiastic.
“The information contained on training.com.au speaks directly to businesses, cutting through the jargon and supplying easy to follow, step-by-step processes from employing a New Apprentice to becoming an enterprise RTO,” she said.
A one-stop shop for business
Portal steering committee member Karen Audley, Woolworths Ltd’s traineeship manager, says the portal will be a giant advance in service for VET clients like Woolworths.
“Clients like us will have one web entry point for VET and be able to navigate quickly and easily to the information, product, service or organisation we want,” she says.
“It’s providing added impetus to VET authorities to simplify their processes and make them more consistent across the country, which is exactly what national employers like us are seeking.”
The next step
Initially the portal will provide services to large, medium, and small businesses, and enterprise registered training organisations (RTOs).
The site will expand its services progressively to all RTOs and, eventually, to learners and the general community in 2004.
For further information contact: Fiona Hamilton, ANTA. Ph: (07) 3246 2468, fax: (07) 3246 2490, email hamiltonf@anta.gov.au
The Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson, Minister for Education Science and Training, launching the first release of training.com.au
The Minister for Education, Science and Training, the Hon Dr Brendan Nelson MP, announced the outcome of the third tender round for New Apprenticeships Support Services on 15 April 2003.
The tender round, which took six months to complete and included strict probity provisions, will see contracts awarded to a total of 37 organisations in all States and Territories. The three year contracts begin from 1 July 2003.
As a result of the tender, New Apprenticeships Centres will be providing advice and assistance from around 500 sites – a significant increase from the 300 sites available previously.
A key aspect of the tender was to ensure effective services in rural and regional Australia. This has been reflected in the dramatic increase in the number of New Apprenticeships Centre sites in non-metropolitan areas – from around 200 to 333.
New Apprenticeships Centres are vital to the promotion and take-up of New Apprenticeships – as well as managing the Commonwealth’s Incentives Programme, they provide information and support, and work with a range of organisations to ensure that employers and their New Apprentices are provided with the best possible training.
Under the new contract, New Apprenticeships Centres will continue to provide the same quality services as they have always done, but with an increased focus on achieving successful outcomes. To support this, there is greater emphasis on providing assistance during the first few months of a New Apprenticeship, which in the past has been when a large proportion of withdrawals and cancellations have occurred.
Over the next three years, New Apprenticeships Centres will help employers sign up an estimated total of 770,000 Australians for training in New Apprenticeships in more than 500 different occupations.
For more information on the New Apprenticeships Support Services tender, visit www.newapprenticeships.gov.au and click on ‘3rd NASS contracts’.
Australian employers are spending more on training their employees, according to recent figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics
Employers reported a total of $3.7billion in direct spending on structured training during the 2001-2002 financial year - a 52% increase compared to 1996.
The biggest single item of direct spending – over a billion dollars –- was on trainers’ wages and salaries. Nearly $3 billion was spent on other direct training costs like fees to external training providers and expenditure on training facilities and equipment. This was offset by about $365 million employers received in training related subsidies and payments.
Net direct expenditure averaged $458 per employee and represented 1.3% of total gross wages and salaries.
Structured training was most commonly delivered using external workshops, lectures and tutorials (76% of employers that provided training), followed by structured on-the-job training (55%) and internal workshops, lectures and tutorials (42%). The majority of employers that provided structured training used external training providers for some, or all, or that training (92%).
Around one in five employers did not provide any training to their employees. Most (80%) said this was because their employees were already adequately trained.
The Training Expenditure and Practices Survey was conducted by ABS with full funding from the Australian National Training Authority.
For more details, visit the ABS website http://www.abs.gov.au/ and look at the Employer Training Expenditure and Practices survey, catalogue number 6362.0.
More people with a disability will be helped into post-secondary education and the workforce following the launch of a new $3.7 million Commonwealth programme over three years.
The Disability Coordination Officer (DCO) Programme, announced as part of the Australians Working Together package, increases opportunities for people with a disability to go from school and the community to vocational education and training and university.
20 new DCOs offer information, coordination and referral services for people with a disability who are interested in or enrolled in post-school education and training, helping them to succeed in their chosen studies and move to suitable employment.
The DCOs work closely with the existing 11 Regional Disability Liaison Officers (RDLOs - also funded by the Department) based in universities, to provide a comprehensive national support network for people with a disability interested in post school study.
The DCO initiative is designed to overcome the lack of information and knowledge that can prevent people with a disability successfully participating in post-compulsory education, especially in regional, rural and remote Australia.
Details of the DCO and RDLO regions and contracted organisations are shown below.
State/Territory |
Program |
Region |
Contracted organisation (phone no.) |
New South Wales |
DCO
DCO
RDLO
DCO
RDLO
DCO
|
North NSW
West NSW
Hunter Valley/Central Coast
North & central Sydney
Greater western Sydney
South Sydney & south-east
NSW
|
University of New England (ph. 02 6773 2130)
OCTEC Inc (ph. 02 6362 7973)
University of Newcastle (ph. 02 4921 8844)
Centre for Development Disability Studies
(ph. 02 8878 0500)
University of Western Sydney
(ph. 02 9772 6314)
TAFE NSW – Illawarra Institute
(ph. 02 4221 8909) |
ACT |
DCO |
Canberra |
Canberra Institute of Technology (part-time position) (ph. 02 6207 4900) |
Victoria |
DCO
RDLO
DCO
DCO
DCO
|
North Victoria
West Victoria
Central & south-west Melbourne
North & east Melbourne & surrounds
Outer south-east Melbourne & east Victoria |
Goulburn Ovens Institute of TAFE
(ph. 03 5833 2526)
University of Ballarat (ph. 03 5327 9956)
RMIT University (ph. 03 9925 2967)
RMIT University (ph. 03 9925 5269)
Central Gippsland Institute of TAFE (two part-time positions) (ph. 03 9781 3388 or 03 5134 6377)
|
Queensland |
RDLO
RDLO
RDLO
DCO
DCO
|
North Queensland
Central Queensland
South-west Queensland
Brisbane
Gold Coast & south Brisbane
|
James Cook University (two part-time positions) (ph. 07 4042 1527, 07 4781 6292)
Central Queensland University (ph. 07 4930 6394)
University of Southern Queensland (ph. 07 4631 1410)
House With No Steps Queensland (ph. 07 5479 3786)
House With No Steps Queensland (ph. 07 5593 8340) |
South Australia |
DCO
RDLO
DCO
|
North South Australia
Adelaide
South-east Adelaide & east South Australia
|
Spencer Institute of TAFE (part-time position) (ph. 08 8648 9926)
University of South Australia (ph. 08 8302 1756)
Onkaparinga Institute of TAFE (part-time position) (ph. 08 8735 1542) |
Western Australia |
RDLO
DCO
DCO
DCO
|
Central, north & east Perth
South Perth & south Western Australia
Eastern Goldfields
North Western Australia
|
Edith Cowan University (ph. 08 9273 8480)
Edge Employment Solutions Inc. (ph. 08 9388 8550)
Curtin Institute of Technology VET Centre (part-time position) (ph. 08 9088 6048)
Pilbara College of TAFE (part-time position) (ph. 08 9159 6748) |
Tasmania |
RDLO
DCO |
South & central Tasmania
North Tasmania |
University of Tasmania (ph. 03 6226 1796)
Institute of TAFE Tasmania (part-time position) (ph. 03 6336 2702) |
Northern Territory |
RDLO
DCO
|
Darwin
Rural NT/Central Australia
|
University of the Northern Territory (ph. 08 8946 6951)
Human Service Training Advisory Council Inc (two part-time positions) (ph. 08 8981 2550, or 08 8953 4488) |
In a competitive employment environment, it is vital to have the right skills for your desired career. However in Newcastle there is a programme that not only allows its participants to develop industry skills, but also allows them to apply these skills to benefit their local community.
Recently 15 jobseekers participated in a New Apprenticeship Access Programme (NAAP) specialising in Construction (Painting) industry skills. As a part of their industry training the participants painted two houses in the Newcastle suburb Wallsend for 10 people with physical disabilities.
The NAAP participants worked closely with the residents to ensure they got what they wanted. The Spastic Centre presented the participants with a short orientation to help them understand the specific communication and physical needs of the residents. Group Training Australia, the NAAP broker, received glowing reports from the residents about the friendly, courteous manner of the participants, as well as the quality job they performed.
NAAP provided a realistic avenue in which the participants could practise their new skills while significantly enhancing the lives of people with disabilities.
HGT Australia provided the training, support and assistance to the NAAP participants, 14 of which have since been offered New Apprenticeships. DBT Australia, a provider of underground mining equipment, donated the paint. This successful initiative was possible through the collaborative efforts of HGT Australia, Group Training Australia, DEST and DBT Australia.
For more information about NAAP you can visit the NAAP website http://naap.dest.gov.au
A new Training Package is increasing the capacity of international relief workers and showcasing the Australian Qualifications Framework to the world.
In March 2003, the National Training Quality Council of Australia endorsed World Vision’s Humanitarian Relief Training Package.
The Package is an initiative of World Vision Australia, World Vision’s Asia Pacific Disaster Management Office, and World Vision International. It will be available for use by World Vision staff across the world as well as other aid agencies.
The Training Package is expected to be of particular benefit to staff working in war zones who need to arrange essentials such as food, water and sanitation for communities.
Qualifications in the Package range from Certificate III to Diploma level and focus on three priority areas: commodities (procuring and distributing food); programming (designing, implementing and evaluating relief programmes); and finance.
A number of elective units are included, such as minimising the threat from explosive devices, maintaining personal safety in a high-risk environment and promoting the well-being of children.
Implementation of the Training Package will initially focus on the Asia Pacific region, before extending to World Vision’s other international operations.
For more information, contact Geoff Shepherd, World Vision Australia. Ph (03) 92872231, Fax 1300 303 448, websites: http://www.reliefstandards.org/ or http://www.worldvision.com.au/
By Greg Bryant, DEST National POEMs Coordinator
The POEM initiative is creating education, training and youth support corridors far beyond early expectations. From Alice Springs, the Stuart Highway crosses outback Australia for more than 1200 kilometres before reaching Port Augusta. Another 300 kilometres south and travellers finally reach Adelaide. This is a journey of well over 15 hours and yet for many young people in Alice Springs this road forms a natural corridor that connects them with family in Port Augusta and Adelaide as well as with education, training and work opportunities.
Recently eight young people travelled down this corridor in a bus hired from the local Alice Springs High School. They travelled to Adelaide to make connections: some with family, some to find out about support opportunities should they find themselves in Adelaide, some to experience the “city”, and others to find out about higher education opportunities through Tauondi (Nunga TAFE) and the Flinders University Aboriginal Studies Unit.
So why is this journey special? The young people involved have had their ups and downs to say the least and all of them had found themselves disconnected from education well before completing high school. That was until each of them found their way to the Alice Outcomes program.
In 2002 Alice Outcomes was successful in attracting funding under the Commonwealth’s POEM initiative. This initiative has funded 21 organisations (a mixture of schools, community agencies, registered training organisations, local governments and so on) across Australia to provide accredited education for disconnected young people in supportive community learning environments.
The support workers from Alice Outcomes, Carly and Simon, took the guys to visit the Youth Education Centre at Magill in Adelaide’s eastern suburbs. A POEM project also operates from this site. The young people from Alice Springs were excited to find out that there were other education projects to help young people like them. This went even further to lessen their sense of isolation because not only do these guys live in a geographically isolated part of Australia but they are also somewhat marginalised within their own community.
When I arrived at the Youth Education Centre, I found the crew from Alice busily learning how to repair tyres, balance them and fit them to cars. While one young mum was jacking up the car and putting the wheel on, others of the group were using the tyre fixing equipment that is fitted to the Adelaide POEM project’s mobile tyre fitting unit (ANTA funded). This is a very impressive trailer that allows training to go where the young people are BUT DON’T CALL THIS THING A TRAILER because it really is the “Taj Mahal of mobile tyre fitting”.
Meanwhile, the young people who go to the POEM project at Magill were having their first day back after holidays but that didn’t stop them showing the Alice crew around their place and cooking up a BBQ lunch for them.
The guys from Alice were impressed with the Adelaide project and as their bus pulled away to continue their South Australian experience, Gerri and Paul who run the POEM at Magill, were still assuring them that they had found an open door at the end of the corridor.
There has recently been some media attention on the level of long-term unemployment in Australia. Long-term unemployment is defined as the number of people who have been out of work for one year or more.
There are two statistical series that currently provide this information. Centrelink publishes data on the number of people who have been receiving unemployment benefits for 12 months or more. However, these data do not provide an accurate measure of long-term unemployment as they include people who are working part-time but who also receive income support. For instance, in March 2003, 19 per cent of long-term unemployment beneficiaries earned some form of private income, almost half of whom earned over $240 per fortnight. To count people who are gainfully employed on a part-time basis in any measure of long-term unemployment is clearly not appropriate.
This series also includes people who have worked full-time for up to 13 weeks yet, under Centrelink rules, are still counted as long-term unemployed.
The other series, published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, is the official measure of long-term unemployment as it provides a more accurate, objective and consistent measure of labour market disadvantage. These statistics show a considerable improvement in the number of long-term unemployed people over the last decade. For instance, long-term unemployment has fallen by 195,400 (or 59 per cent) since the peak of 329,800 recorded in May 1993.
For more information contact Ivan Neville in the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations on (02) 6121 6720.
Market segmentation’ sounds like something only advertising executives would be interested in. Not so. The Research and Performance Directorate in the Western Australian Department of Education and Training has for the last couple of years been conducting extensive research into the segmentation of the vocational education and training ‘market’. Their findings will be of interest to all those concerned with the continuous improvement of client outcomes in the VET sector.‘
Initially the research has focussed on client segmentation as an important tool to assist with understanding and responding to the training needs of client groups.
By examining the students’ reasons for study and other key characteristics, the student population can be divided into seven segments: Apprentices/Trainees, skills improvers, career changers, self employed, labour market entrants, ‘bridgers’ (studying to gain entry into another course) and people seeking to further their education, though not necessarily directly for career reasons.
The distribution of the student population across the segments varies strongly by age, gender, and educational background showing a strong ‘age and stage’ link with learning needs. This provides a useful perspective on lifelong learning.
Using the identified student segments as a basis for analysis also helps provide a clear overview of the effectiveness of training. It assists in identifying those combinations of student segments and industries which are a priority in terms of replicating positive outcomes or redressing adverse ones.
Because the motivations prompting each segment to participate in vocational education and training are different, it is also useful to consider “success” factors separately for each group.
Detailed reports as well as a set of easy-to-read brochures outlining the highlights of the research are available from http://www.training.wa.gov.au/resources/content-research-perform.asp
Ms Moira Scollay, chaired her last meeting of the ANTA Chief Executive Officers meeting on 13 May 2003. Ms Scollay will end her term as CEO of ANTA after the ANTA Ministerial Council meeting in June.
On Moira's departure, Colin Walters, VET Group Manager at DEST, stated that:
"People throughout the VET system will be very sorry to say farewell to Moira as she prepares to leave the helm at ANTA. Her time as Chief Executive has seen a huge transformation of the VET system, including rapid growth in student and New Apprenticeship numbers, the successful roll out of the training package system and major developments in terms of the quality and national consistency of our system. Moira has worked tirelessly as ANTA CEO and with enormous commitment to the task. Her leadership qualities have extended well beyond the ambit of the staff of ANTA, and many people within DEST who have dealt with her over the last few years will greatly miss the drive, inspiration and cooperative spirit Moira has brought to our shared agenda.
All the very best for what lies ahead, Moira. Your legacy is one to be very proud of and we shall miss you enormously."
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This page was last updated on: Monday, 09 February 2004
Department of Education, Science and Training.