Opinion
There has been much debate recently about how we can continue to reshape the perception of TAFE from a ‘second-choice’ pathway to an equal first-choice that provides highly advanced, innovative skills that are critical to addressing our workforce and economic needs.
Part of this debate questions whether the way we measure the success of TAFE and initiatives like the Victorian Free TAFE is fit-for-purpose.
Historically, governments measure TAFE outcomes via course completion – a signal that qualifications have been achieved and skills made available in our economy.
Focusing solely or primarily on completion rates is a one-dimensional view of skills success. In today’s world of increased scrutiny on how public education operates – higher expectations from communities and stakeholders and more ways to slice and dice data than ever before – we wonder whether completion rates are the right metric.
A recent Nous report, Employment Outcomes for Victorian TAFE Learners, commissioned by the Victorian TAFE Association, supports a more three-dimensional perspective. The report found that 91% of Victorian TAFE students achieve their employment-related goals because of undertaking a VET course with TAFE, demonstrating that TAFE is effectively supporting pathways into work.
Nous recommends that we should measure success by whether students achieve their employment goals – including new entry or re-entry to the workforce, through part-time or full-time employment, a promotion, upskilling in an existing role, moving on to further study.
Ultimately, what anyone wants from skills is to put them to use; to get a job, to be productive and through this, grow our economy so that all Victorians prosper.
The fact that 91% of TAFE learners achieve their employment goal is an extraordinary return on public investment. Unfortunately, this was not reflected in the recent Victorian Auditor-General Office (VAGO)’s report on Free TAFE. The VAGO report assesses whether “the Free TAFE initiative (is) providing training for priority skills and delivering benefits to Victorians”.
Unfortunately, the report largely remained trapped in a one-dimensional view of TAFE success that privileges completion rates as the best measure of success.
According to Nous, TAFEs are delivering consistently strong outcomes across priority industries in Victoria, with learners achieving their employment-related goals, including:
- 94% in the clean economy
- 93% in advanced manufacturing and defence
- 92% in health technologies and medical research
- 92% in construction
- 90% in agribusiness.
And importantly, these outcomes are being achieved across priority cohorts, with a high proportion of priority learners fully or partly achieving their employment-related goals:
- 94% of outer regional learners
- 91% of Indigenous learners
- 91% of learners experiencing socio-economic disadvantage
- 91% of women.
These results clearly demonstrate that TAFE and Free TAFE are contributing to real employment outcomes and equipping Victorians with the skills to close workforce gaps and drive Victoria’s economic prosperity. And these outcomes are consistent even where the learner only partially completes their qualification.
According to the Victorian Skills Authority, Victoria requires 1.4 million jobs by 2034 to account for employer growth and replace those exiting the workforce. We clearly need more workers to join the workforce, whether that be women returning to employment or the underemployed reskilling to earn more in a different industry or role.
TAFE critical to supplying skilled, job-ready workers, and Free TAFE is vital because it removes a key blocker for workers taking up training – the upfront tuition fees.
Free TAFE is making training more accessible for students from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds who otherwise would not be able to access training to reskill or upskill.
So, the question is not whether TAFE, or even Free TAFE is leading to outcomes – because we know without a doubt, it is. It's what we determine that outcome means that matters and whether we value making skills training accessible to everyone.
The VAGO report also ignores some other crucial context. For example, completion rate data in Victoria includes TAFE training occurring in the corrections system, which has a very low completion rate and significantly brings down the average. A TAFE learner in prison that moves facility or finishes their sentence before completing the qualification is counted as a non-complete – even if they re-start and complete later. Victoria is the only state that includes corrections system data in completion rates.
If we all want a healthy labour supply, more jobs and a return on investment in vocational education, then the single measure of completion just doesn’t cut it.
What does cut it is an accessible, future‑proof TAFE system that continues to deliver opportunity – and employment – for decades to come.
Alex White is CEO of the Victorian TAFE Association