Starting from scratch

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Applied learning -
Starting from scratch?
Jeff Malley June 2005 (jeffmalley_at_bigblue.net.au)
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Paradigm shifts

• Learning
• Skilling entry and on going
• Work organisation
• Values and culture
• Government

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• 1. External drivers of change
• Globalisation capacity to compete and
  participate in global markets
• Technological change improved ways of doing
  things through innovation, invention, research
  and development
• Changing patterns of work
• Demography
• Values and ideology

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For a given labour productivity growth rate, the
effect of population ageing on labour supply is
to slow Australias economic growth over the
coming decades. GDP per capita growth rates are
projected to fall steadily over the period to
around 2025, with a partial recovery thereafter.
The dip mainly reflects the ageing and withdrawal
of the baby boomers from the labour force. GDP
per capita growth is projected to slump to around
1.25 per cent a year by the mid 2020s roughly
half its rate in 2003-04 and one-third lower than
without ageing. The longer run prognosis for
economic growth per capita of 1.75 per cent a
year reflects the fact that labour supply growth
per capita in a stable population will be close
to zero, so that growth only depends on the
underlying rate of labour productivity growth.
(op cit pxxvi)
Source Productivity Commission (2005). Economic
implications of an ageing Australia. Canberra,
Australian Government, Productivity Commission.
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• 2. Reactions and expectations
• Nations will participate by reducing barriers to
  trade and adopting a market ideology
• Increasing levels of labour skill,
  responsiveness and flexibility required
• Education levels are proxy measures of skill.
  Higher levels of education acquired by more
  people are necessary if change is technologically
  driven
• Responses to globalisation and technology are
  handled better at a regional or devolved level
• Governments should provide an overall policy
  framework to set directions but not set one size
  fits all solutions
• Governments do not have the resources to meet
  all demands. User pays and social capital
  accumulation. The use of public and private
  partnerships by governments. User pays in
  education and training.
• Commodification of learning

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• 3. Areas of change in education
• reform of education systems
• raise the floor more people with higher levels
• breakdown silos
• outcomes measures
• integrations work and education school and
  post school vocational and academic
• pathways concept of progression and
  accountability how many, how far. Focus on
  15-19 year olds and transition issues.
• key competencies. What can education systems
  guarantee as outcomes. Outcomes for working and
  social life. At the base level literacy,
  numeracy and science and technology. Culture and
  values?
• understanding life long learning models this
  is weak.
• qualification award and recognition systems

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• 4. Management models (the dominant model does
  it support change?)
• centralised systems with top down command and
  control hierarchies
• centrally determined funding allocations
• centrally determined staffing and staff
  conditions
• minimal recognition to local needs through
  parent/community committees
• centrally determined performance and
  accountability measures. Reporting is upwards
• centrally determined curriculum, qualification
  structures and standards
• marginal recognition of variation to suit local
  need
• central policy frameworks are assumed to reflect
  the needs of all
• substantial change to the framework takes a long
  time and is contested
• Management and learning models from industry (the
  learning organisation, Investing in People etc)
  are they more in tune with change?

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• 5. Ongoing issues
• funding and resourcing
• partnerships, collaboration and sharing
  individuals, enterprises, the state and the
  community
• outcomes and standards
• staffing quantity and quality
• stepping outside the square for solutions and
  gaining acceptance
• performance measures and accountability
• the links between education, learning and work
• systems reform

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Workforce dynamics what happens and why?
Re entry
Immigration
Temporary departure unemployment, parenting,
illness, reskilling etc
New entrants (transition from education to work)
Workforce
What happens in here ? Technology, productivity,
business cycles, personal growth, dreams,
transactions between individuals and
organisations.
Permanent departure - retirement
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• What is happening inside the workforce?
• The rise of the short term part time labour
  market
• Rising numbers of school completers
• Rising number of degree graduates
• Increasing outflow (demographics)
• Increasing productivity
• New technologies and techniques
• Globalisation
• Rise of the SMEs
• Skill shortages in some areas
• Turbulence (separations, downsizings, reduced
  time with one employer, loyalty, mobility)
• Increased mobility across and upwards skills,
  occupations and location
• Wage deregulation
• Child bearing deferral and lower birth rates
• Do we really know? Most available data is
  snapshot and does not illuminate a pathways
  history.

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Issues -

• From the perspective of the individual engaging
  in the workforce over a period of time we do not
  know enough about the connected events that
  influence the type and nature of labour force
  participation.
• Much of our information has come from snapshot
  cross sectional studies that rely on simple
  linear models of education and qualification
  progression and employee wage based earnings
  (often full time only).
• In the last ten years the nature of the
  workplace, work organisation, skill and
  employment have significantly changed.
• Skills in demand and higher or improved benefits
  are not necessarily related to university
  pathways.
• Education, training and employment support
  organisations (and parents?) have used old
  stereotypic models of occupation, skill,
  qualification and reward as career models to
  youth at the pre entry point to labour force
  participation.
• Understanding the movement of people is more
  than supply and demand adjusment through wage and
  conditions mechanisms.
• Multi discipline approach required that includes
  social capital and capacity building as well as
  classical human capital and internal labour
  market approaches. Improved theory.

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Not that politicians could ignore the fact that
businesses large and small are probably facing
the greatest skills shortage in a generation,
when unemployment is at its lowest in a similar
time frame. And industry estimates suggest the
problem will only worsen in years to come, with
more than double the number of skilled employees
forecast to leave the workforce than enter it.
The Age, October 8 2004 The shortage of
tradespeople in Australia was so severe that some
firms are importing skilled workers from South
Africa.Prime Minister John Howard must address
Australia's skills shortage crisis as a top
priority, a peak business group said yesterday.
Herald Sun, October 20, 2004
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ALP strategists now concede that the PM tapped a
rich vein of Labor support. Former skilled
apprentices, who are now subcontractors and
employers, heard two messages as small
businesses, they would be looked after by a
Liberal government that acknowledged their "trade
pride" and that also recognised their struggle
to find apprentices. Several Bracks ministers
worry that the whole issue of technical training
is about to become one of the key planks in a
move towards a radical new federalism, the thin
edge of a wedge Canberra plans to drive into
states' monopoly on education. "Tech schools"
have been anathema to some Labor ideologues for
more than 30 years, regarding them as
second-class institutions designed to stream
working-class children into working-class
jobs. Bracks ministers worry that the whole
issue of technical training is about to become
one of the key planks in a move towards a radical
new federalism. The Age October 31 2004
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RMIT ARC proposal on trajectories of bachelor
degree and trade graduates during the first ten
years of working life.With the Victorian
Department of Education and Training, NCVER and
The Skilled Group.
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Hypothetical distribution of occupational
pathways or trajectories of a cohort of trade
graduates
As an employee
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Strategic management. MBA
Plant management. Bachelor degree P/T
Base line occupational status immediately after
graduation
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Production level management. Part time study at
AQF 4/Diploma
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First line supervision. Extended technical and
management skills through on the job learning
100
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Owner/operator
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Employs 1-5 including apprentices. Establish
family company. Trade and community association
learning
10
Creates a limited company. Employs 6-20.
Specialized production/services
As an employer
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Unemployed or NLF
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0
12
Years since initial qualification completion
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Hypothetical distribution of occupational
pathways or trajectories of a cohort of
trade/degree graduates
As an employee

• Benefits
• labour market participation and status
• Skill formation
• Critical incidents

Base line occupational status immediately after
graduation
100
As an employer
Unemployed or NLF
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0
12
Years since initial qualification completion
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What of occupational moves and skill and
qualification acquisitions over 12 years? The
pathways concept.
Apprent Degree

• Employed, unemployed, underemployed
• Employee to owner operator to employer
• Specialist line function to middle/higher level
  management
• From single skill/specialisation to multi
  skill/specialisation
• From single qualification to mutiple and higher
  order quals

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The Apprentice Pathway
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Pathways from apprenticeship

• Traditional The apprentice, to the journeyman to
  the master and employer.
• The modern A From apprentice to trades
  specialist and technician, to supervisor, to
  sales and production planning, to manager.
• The modern B from apprentice to subcontractor,
  to small business owner and employer

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Apprenticeship a time honoured model of learning

• Teachers, doctors of medicine, nurses, surveyors,
  accountants, performing and visual artists
• Motor mechanics, electricians, plumbers, chefs,
  hair dressers, machinists, tool makers,
  upholsterers
• Learning on the job indentures or contracts
• Learning by doing in a relevant context
• Standards and guilds

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Occupational average weekly earningsMay, 2002.
Source ABS 6306.0 Employee Earnings and Hours,
Australia
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Industry category average weekly earnings
May, 2002. Source ABS 6306.0 Employee
Earnings and Hours, Australia
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Supply side responses
Demand side responses

• increase numbers of youth at entry by
• promoting successful pathway and crossover
  stories
• amend qualification frameworks to give
  equivalence to applied learning methods and
  outcomes
• amend attendance and school organisation
  requirements to include work and work based
  learning
• amend youth wages and allowances
• improve RPL conditions for entry into post
  school qualifications
• increase supply of existing skilled workers
  through targetted life long learning or extension
  programs with recognised outcomes.
• improve conditions for adult entry into skilled
  occupations in demand
• State develops a strategic approach to life long
  learning provision that includes learning
  institutions, employers, skilled individuals and
  community organisations

• increase number of employers committed to long
  term participation in indentured training and
  prevocational programs by an improved incentive
  scheme
• employers provide targetted skill and wage
  initiatives based on an understanding of skill
  and occupational trajectories of existing workers
• establish different work arrangements based on
  knowledge of the needs of different groups at
  various stages of a career trajectory
• establish regional partnerships to share skilled
  labour in demand
• employers engage in more realistic workforce
  planning, including recruitment and promotion

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Education and Training Systems

• A little bit of history

• The pursuit of the academic glory model of
  education leads to a realization of a need for
  change.

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Policy Influences on Youth in Transition - a
labour market and training bias
1974 Australian Labour Market Training Report ,
the Cochrane Report.
... long term restructuring of the workforce....
increase general level of skill.... remove
inequalities and enhance employment
opportunities... training arrangements to be
flexible covering the full range of occupational
skills.
1974 The Kangan Report - establishing a national
TAFE entity
1979 Education, Training and Employment Report,
the Williams Report.
1979 Study Group on Structural Adjustment, the
Crawford Report.
1980 Technological Change in Australia Meyer
Report
1985 Inquiry into Labour Market Programs Kirby
Report
1987 ACTU Australia Reconstructed
1988 NBEET established
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Development Path of the Training Reform Agenda
1990 Deveson Report TAFE sector not
responsive to industry
1991 Finn Report - Targets for youth
1992 Mayer Report - key or basic competencies to
assist transition to work
1992 The Carmichael Report .....this report
is proposing a medium to long term response to
structural adjustment and concomitant training
needs. Among the factors relevant to training
reform are Australias international trade,
the relations between trade and microeconomic
reform, workplace reform and the labour market.
a structural reform of the training system using
mixed pathways, including school and workplace
learning.
1983 - 1992 ACTU/Government Accords Mk I to VII
1992 ANTA
1994 Youth Training Wage Agreement
1993 Hilmer Report - Competition Policy
1994 Working Nation, NETTFORCE ASTF (ECEF)
1993/1994 AVTS Pilots
1996 - MAATS /New Apprenticeships VET in
Schools ANTA funding Workplace Relations Act
AQF NTF
1995 Karpin Report, Enterprising Nation
Leadership Management Skills
1999 MCEETYA Adelaide agreement, connecting a
broadly specification of vocational studies into
the curriculum.
MCEETYA agreements on VET in Schools, 1998,
Boards of Studies, in agreement with
State/Territory Recognition Authorities, will
recognise as VET in schools only that which
delivers national industry and/or enterprise
competency standards.
1999 The last Industrial Training Commissioner
removed - Qld
2000 Kirby Review, Victoria
2005 Demise of ANTA
2002 VCAL introduced
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Training Package Learning Model First
Principles? Systems and CBT.
OUTPUT
FEEDBACK

• Embedded within this systems model of
  learning/training are particular characteristics
  of the CBT approach. They are
• the breaking down of any human task into a set
  of component tasks which are defined in terms of
  behavioural outcomes.
• specification of standards or criteria to be
  achievd by learners to indicate outcome
  achievement of each task component.
• an assumption of integration and transfer of
  component tasks to a higher order of overall task
  or skill completion.
• provision for an appropriate range of
  instruction or learning environments appropriate
  to the task at hand.
• public sharing of the objectives, standards and
  means of assessment.
• assessment of learning only in terms of the
  competency criteria.
• accountability for the learner to meet the
  competency criteria.
• provision for the learner to enter and leave the
  cycle on demonstrated competencies.

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A view of the future? Learning pathways redefined.
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WORK
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University
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A possibility? Cooperative College of Applied and
Vocational Learning (CCAVL)
School complete Year 9 or 10
Work
School while completing years 10-12
Higher education
To or contemporary
From
Unemployment or disengagement

• Years 10-13, VCE and VCAL, Certificates 1-3, 1st
  year University, Industry specific courses.
• Applied learning orientation
• Partnership provision and governance with
  University, TAFE and schools on education side
  enterprises and industry and labour associations
  on other.
• Flexible enrolment/timetable

TAFE/ACE
Employment
Contracted training
Unemployment NILF
Overseas as fee paying or as international aid
contribution
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Youth entry points
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Main reasons for early school leaving ACER,
LSAY No 31, 2003
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About 206,200 15 to 19 year olds
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School leaver destinations
15-24 year olds who attended a secondary school
in Victoria in 1999 and were not attending
secondary school in 2000 (As at May).
Total not attending secondary school in 2000 who
were attending in 1999 100
66 Attending other forms of education and
training in 2000
34 Not attending any other form of education and
training
77,855
51,615
26,240
2
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19
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Attending higher education in 2000
Attending TAFE
Attending other type
Attended Year 12 in 1999
Attended Year 11 or less
Source Unpublished data from ABS Transition
survey
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The system
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Waddell, S. J. (2002) Six Societal Learning
Concepts for a New Era of Engagement.
Reflections, 3, 4,
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Where does globalisation fit? Technological
change? Global markets? Technological change,
markets and work organisation? National
government response to these? Attract and
maintain investment through a range of policies,
including taxation and redistribution through
skilling and education programs.
Degrees of responsiveness or control to external
issues. The further out the less responsive and
less control or effect. Note this is a static
picture that does not represent time. External
events that were once considered distant and
beyond influence can over time become close and
demand responses.
External environments
Policy/Government
Institutions
People
Level 1
Level 2
Level 3
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Steven J. Waddell, 2002, Six Societal Learning
Concepts for a New Era of Engagement,Volume 3,
Number 4. REFLECTIONS, Society for Organizational
Learning, MIT
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Steven J. Waddell, 2002, Six Societal Learning
Concepts for a New Era of Engagement,Volume 3,
Number 4. REFLECTIONS, Society for Organizational
Learning, MIT
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Steven J. Waddell, 2002, Six Societal Learning
Concepts for a New Era of Engagement,Volume 3,
Number 4. REFLECTIONS, Society for Organizational
Learning, MIT
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Lietaer, B. (2003) A World in Balance.
Reflections 4, 5.
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The future

• Continued emphasis on youth and values at entry
• Values beginning to shift away from emphasis on
  the academic
• More user pays
• Greater emphasis on youth at the margins
• Rise of regionalsim, BUT, within strong central
  guidelines
• Rise of communities and cooperativism

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Problematics

• Occupational turbulence and the continuing
  redesign of work
• Globalisation and technology
• Coming to a workable arrangement between firm and
  individual skill and learning needs
• The role of the state in life long learning
• Work life balance