When TAFE and industry work together

Let's look at some of the things being achieved by TAFE as it becomes more attuned to the needs of industrial and commercial clients.

For instance, TAFE NSW's Riverina Institute, with partial funding from the Workplace English Language and Literacy (WELL) Program, recently worked with SunRice to create hundreds of in-house training materials based on the Food Processing Training Package.

Or that students and professionals from various industries can obtain a coveted global Information Technology (IT) qualification – Microsoft Certification, now offered through TAFE NSW's Sydney and Hunter institutes.

These initiatives and others are detailed in the latest TAFELINK, an online newsletter published by TAFE NSW. I'm grateful to Suzanne Fleming for passing it on.

In the previous post, Grumpy Old Tutor mocked Andrew Robb, the new Federal Minister for Vocational and Further Education, after he told The Australian he would reform Australia's TAFEs by sending them out into workplaces. As we pointed out, TAFEs around the nation had carried out those reforms years ago.

You can read TAFELINK here.

In fairness to Robb, we'd also like to point to Robb's speech to the National Press Club in mid-March, where he spelled out his plans for vocational education in Australia. They go a long way beyond the measures described in the next post, which was based on The Australian's report.

Andrew Robb should learn the facts before he opens his mouth about TAFE training

Andrew Robb is one of those hard-right political conservatives who share a trait with our Prime Minister – he knows what needs to be done, and he's not going to waste any time learning the facts before he spells it out.

So the newly appointed Federal Minister for Vocational and Further Education, in an interview published by The Australian yesterday under the heading “Plan for TAFE to go into worksites”, said TAFE colleges would offer flying squads of teachers for workplace classrooms under a government blueprint for education reform.

“Under his plan, TAFE colleges would become more entrepreneurial. They will be allowed to keep profits from innovative course offerings and send trainers to work sites rather than forcing employers to let their staff have time off to travel to education centres,” The Australian reported.

“The whole four-walls, classroom mentality of TAFE has to change," he told the newspaper.

“It's about being able to work with local industry on designing programs which can be delivered in the workplace, at a price.”

I've got news for Andrew Robb. TAFE in New South Wales made those changes years ago. And I believe they're matched by other Technical and Further Education systems throughout Australia.

I emailed a friend, Suzanne Fleming – who is also an occasional mentor for my blogging – and she assured me that TAFE in New South Wales has been going into workplaces for years. Suzanne, I should say, knows what she's talking about.

For almost three years, she was the State Manager for the TAFE/Workcover Retraining Project – a major project to retrain injured workers. The program had an annual budget of two million dollars and it was delivered at all TAFE NSW institutes, at a total of 17 campuses.

In an email a while back, she told me: “It was the first big fee-for-service program TAFE became involved in. Now they do much larger ones, but this one broke new ground.”

One of Suzanne's friends helped organise TAFE's delivery of a meat-cutting training module for Australia's most successful supermarket chain, which had decided it did not need fully qualified tradesmen butchers for much of its meat preparation.

TAFE now offers modules instead of subjects. Butchery workers may take a module covering basic meat-cutting skills, but they could go on to complete all the modules to receive recognition for the full meat trades course.

Another TAFE project delivers life and job skills for people released from prison on parole. The list goes on and on, but you get the idea.

Perhaps TAFE could now prepare a program to correct the ignorance of newly appointed Federal government ministers.

It could be delivered in Parliament House, and of course, for a fee – which would have to be substantial, if the program was to be good enough turn “born to rule” conservatives into open-minded administrators.

You can read The Australian's report here:
http://theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21472399-12332,00.html?from=public_rss

And for evidence that an alive and aware TAFE already offers tailored courses to individual businesses, with the training available in the clients' premises, check these two links.
http://www.tafeplus.com/working.htm
http://www.tafeplus.com/about.htm

Readers might also note that two posts down in this blog, I republish Suzanne's passionate defence of what TAFE now achieves in turning out fully prepared, job-ready people.

Let's admit TAFE is getting it right

It was the front-page lead of The Australian on Wednesday last week, so I could hardly miss it:

UNIVERSITY graduates are increasingly being forced to enrol in TAFE courses to improve their job prospects, with students armed with arts and science degrees finding they do not have the skills to enter the workforce.

New data shows one in five students enrolled in some technical courses had completed university but required further study to obtain employment in their desired field.

As employers demanded higher skills from graduates, an OECD report released yesterday found Australia's schools spent too much time preparing students for university and gave inadequate attention to other training options.

Here's the story:

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21228752-601,00.html

I have an understanding with a friend and occasional mentor, Suzanne Fleming, where I watch out for relevant items printed on dead trees. This one seemed ideal, so I emailed the link. Here's the comment she posted on one of her blogs.

It’s no accident that TAFE is leading the jobs training way. For the past fifteen years the planning and curriculum people have actually been sitting down with industry and commerce leaders and asking them what they need.

TAFE listened and responded. It changed course content, improved teaching methods and it got rid of course padding. Thank God for that. They actually chucked out all that bloody stuff that did nothing to enhance training quality.

And now we can take pride in the fact that graduating TAFE students are properly prepared for the jobs they’re employed for. They can actually be productive workers when they first start their job.

Apart from the usual inductions, TAFE trained people start working on real tasks immediately. Employers don’t have to spend valuable hours retraining them, they can be assigned productive tasks from day one.

I just love wandering around the trade schools. It’s great to watch students building brick walls, house frames, fixing electrical equipment and motor vehicle components or building a boat.

TAFE teachers can take pride in the fact we do it well. The students we send out have great vocational skills.