Let’s take a global perspective on VET – comment by CEO Craig Robertson

This week marks a year since the successful Congress of the World Federation of Colleges and Polytechnics on the banks of the Yarra at the Melbourne Convention Centre. Over 850 delegates, some 250 from overseas, including over 30 young people at a leadership retreat at the Lilydale campus of Box Hill TAFE.

Our leaders seem to be worried about the impact of globalisation on our sovereignty. Countries, tribes and villages have been subject to outside forces for centuries. Think of the raids of Genghis Khan on the Eurasian steppes, the rise and rise of the Roman Empire or Charlemagne’s sweep through Europe. Thank goodness that the Bretton Woods agreement forged after the destruction of the Second World War brought a rules-based order, in the main, to inter-country dealings. But that seems to be failing.

Me reflecting on the reshaping of global order though is a bit like Humphrey Bear hosting Q & A – nice enough but with little to add! What I can comment on though, with some experience is the state of post-school education and training across the globe and our position within it. Through the WFCP I am able to engage with other associations like TDA as well as individual institutions. Speakers at our convention last month, David Hughes, CEO of the Association of Colleges in England and Rick Huijbregts from George Brown College, Toronto, are examples.

The Governor of the Reserve of Australia, Philip Lowe, in comments in August[1] this year said of globalisation: “The earlier waves of globalisation mainly affected firms and workers in the manufacturing industries in the advanced economies. But today’s wave is affecting a much broader range of industries, including the service industries. Many more people now understand that somebody, somewhere else in the world, can do their job, perhaps at a lower rate of pay. This is a result of both advances in technology and the globalisation of business.”

And as TDA said recently in its submission to the Joint Standing Committee on Trade and Investment Growth: “If there’s anything Australia has learned as an open trading economy is the need to face these challenges head-on and not retreating to protectionism. The challenge is harder in the education sphere, however, as most other countries have similar priorities and unlike our natural resources we do not hold proprietary ownership of vocational education.”

Several TAFEs demonstrated their global standing in the WFCP Awards of Excellence last year. Queensland TAFE with the Australian Pacific Technical College won gold for Access to Learning and Employment and Holmesglen also won gold for Student Support. The TAFE NSW National Environment Centre was awarded Silver under the Green Colleges category.

TAFEs are global in nature. It’s not only the international projects they delivery or the international students they serve. The most pressing issue is to prepare Australians through TAFEs to take on the world! The last thing Australia should do is seek to protect its VET system through colloquial or out-of-date products. Australia’s vocational education model has some high standing in the world thanks heavily to the work of TAFEs. Our capacity to survive, actually thrive, on a global skills stage is to train for the new world order for skills. It’s not for the sake of the VET system but the future of many Australian workers.

Applications will be open later this week for the Awards of Excellence for the 2020 Congress in San Sebastian this time next October. Let’s continue showing how well we stand up globally.

TAFEs and Community Providers working together

Kerry Penton, Managing Director of TAFE NSW and I were privileged to attend the launch at the NSW Parliament on 25 September of a special report from the Community Colleges Australia – Vulnerable and Disadvantaged Students of NSW Not-for-Profit Community Education Providers: Analysis of 2018 Data

It was great to participate in the occasion and hear NSW Minister for Skills and Tertiary Education, Dr Geoff Lee  launch the report in the presence of 70 NSW parliamentarians and CCA members.

We need community providers and the sector is all the better when TAFEs and community providers work together. We need a strong network of training organisations which are reaching out into the community to bring people into training, especially those who may be reluctant to embark on such a journey. Brokers by design need a financial return and we have found it costs students dearly. Let’s hope together we can enhance outreach.