The Australian Academy of Humanities wants a role in creating a national skills taxonomy.
Peak training agency Jobs and Skills Australia is working on a one to replace the Australian Skills Classification, which is national in name but not in use by all education and occupation groups, “It is the equivalent of each actor speaking a different language, “JSA suggests.
This does not appear to interest higher education interests all that much, as if skills are a subject for lesser VET beings. But humanities lobbies understand they need to get into every employment game going.
The Deans of Arts, Social Science and Humanities want to work out where what they teach could sit on taxonomy. And the Australian Academy of the Humanities has made a submission to the project which embraces optimism and acknowledges reality.
“We are very confident in our disciplines’ leading role in producing many of the most valuable ‘21st century skills’, but we have work to do to demonstrate that claim in terms that are accessible and agreed across the nation.”
But the Academy does not bother to disguise its case of full-blown FOMO. “The overwhelming focus of skills literature on transferable and human skills comprehensively proves the absurdity of a STEM-centric advocacy for higher learning.
And so it stakes a claim by suggesting how humanities disciplines can describe generic skills a taxonomy will need, such as:
- “skills that are essential for sovereign capabilities, including in languages and cultures”
- “the need for social and ethical skills alongside identification of processes that can be automated through AI, to manage the issues that can be inherent in language learning models, or to avoid the leadership mistakes that led to ‘Robodebt’ “
- “critical thinking skills that support a productive politics, accountability and trust”
And yet, for all the optimism about what the humanities can provide the Academy can’t help including an issue which has as much as nothing to do with Jobs and Skills A, the much loathed but still in-place Job Ready Graduates funding model for student places, that discriminates against the humanities.
The JRG legislation was conceived on flawed assumptions about employability and workforce needs … dismantling it will show that the Government is serious about transferable skills and will energise the movement for comprehensive reform of tertiary education in Australia.
