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The focus of this report, which uses longitudinal data to map the dynamics of the youth labour market and to identify factors that are important in securing full-time work, is on the transition to full-time employment of young people who do not go to university. The study reports on the education and labour market activities of a national sample of youth on their leaving school and analyses the influences of social and demographic factors, school and other educational factors, and initial experiences in the labour market on their post-school activity four years after leaving school, focusing on factors influencing being in full-time employment four years after leaving school. The following research and policy issues are addressed: the general youth labour market situation; the influence of social background factors; the effects of education, including school leaving status and vocational education; and the role of prior labour market experiences. The report contains an executive summary, six chapters and five appendices. Following the introduction, chapter two sets the scene for subsequent chapters by presenting and examining the activity profiles of the group of school leavers who did not go to university; chapter three looks at the pathways of young people in the years leaving school to examine the extent of year-to-year movement in and out of activities; chapter four examines the correlates of activities in the first and fourth years after leaving school, investigating social and socioeconomic background, education and training, and labour market experiences; chapter five explores the influences on securing full-time work using a base model comprising factors found in the previous chapter to have significant influence on being in full-time work in the fourth year after leaving school; and the final chapter addresses the policy and research issues. The report does not support ‘crisis’ accounts of the youth labour market and disputes claims that young people who are not fully engaged in full-time work or study are ‘at risk’ of an unsuccessful school-to-work transition. The findings indicate that: 61% of young men and 45% of young women were in full-time employment in the first year after school; by the fourth year, 77% of young men and 64% of young women were working full-time; the effects of post-secondary vocational education other than apprenticeship and traineeship were mixed; full-time study in the first year after leaving school did not increase the odds of being in full-time work in the fourth year; and among those already in full-time work, a TAFE certificate or diploma tended to further increase the chances of staying in full-time work. Show less

The Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) program studies the progress of several groups of young Australians as they move from school into post-secondary education and work. This technical report is the codebook for wave six of the Y95 cohort. The Y95 cohort of LSAY was drawn from the national sample of approximately 13,000 year nine students. It was constructed by randomly selecting two year nine classes from a national sample of 300 schools designed to represent state and sector. The report describes the contents of the dataset and provides an explanation of all the variables in that dataset. Show less

The Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) program studies the progress of several groups of young Australians as they move from school into post-secondary education and work. This technical report is the codebook for wave six of the Y98 cohort. The Y98 cohort of LSAY was drawn from the national sample of approximately 14,000 year nine students. It was constructed by randomly selecting two year nine classes from a sample of schools designed to represent state and sector. The report describes the contents of the dataset and provides an explanation of all the variables in that dataset. Show less

This technical report is the questionnaires for 1980, 1985 to 1994 for the 1970 cohort of the youth in transition survey. Show less

The Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) program studies the progress of several groups of young Australians as they move from school into post-secondary education and work. This series of documents provides supporting information for the LSAY dataset of the 1995 cohort (Y95) at wave 1 (1995). It includes a questionnaire and codebook. This report, published by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), is part of the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) research program.

Published abstract. Show less

This technical report is the questionnaires for 1975, 1978 to 1994 for the 1961 cohort of the youth in transition survey. Show less

The Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) program studies the progress of several groups of young Australians as they move from school into post-secondary education and work. This technical report is the codebook for wave one0 of the Y95 cohort. The Y95 cohort of LSAY was drawn from the national sample of approximately 13,000 year nine students. It was constructed by randomly selecting two year nine classes from a national sample of 300 schools designed to represent state and sector. The report describes the contents of the dataset and provides an explanation of all the variables in that dataset. Show less

This report is the fourth in a series from The Smith Family examining the post-school plans of young people. It is the first to be able to report findings using longitudinal data. These data are valuable because they allow for study of change and continuity in those plans. The major research questions addressed by the study were: (1) What were student perceptions of the world of work in late 2005 and how had these changed since 2004? (2) To what extent did students’ post-school plans in 2005 imply upward social mobility? (3) What evidence is there of the influence of family expectations on plans to go to university? and (4) What factors shape participants in the Smith Family’s Learning for Life program plans for attending university? This study highlights the importance of ability and interests on students’ educational and vocational plans. The study also introduces the role of family expectations in shaping these plans. Careful thought needs to be given to how family expectations might best be investigated in further projects. However, in this report the focus is upon those students applying for university because of a concern about some of the data relating to course preferences for TAFE. There was evidence that a substantial proportion of those interested in TAFE were confused about differences between Certificate I and II and Certificate III and IV level courses. While identifying this confusion was an important finding, it limited the value of many of the analyses that had been planned for the study.

Other reports from The Smith Family examining the post-school plans of young people are: Post-school plans: aspirations, expectations and implementation: a report prepared for The Smith Family / by Adrian Beavis … [et al.] (indexed at TD/TNC 77.324); Youth unemployment in Australia: a contextual, governmental and organisational perspective: a report by The Smith Family for the AMP foundation / Kristy Muir … [et al.] (indexed at TD/TNC 77.325); What do students think of work?: are they on the right page?: junior secondary school students’ perceptions of the world of work: a report prepared for the Smith Family (indexed at TD/TNC 81.202); and What do students know about work?: senior secondary school students’ perceptions of the world of work: a report prepared for the Smith Family / Adrian Beavis, David Curtis, Nicola Curtis (indexed at TD/TNC 83.158). Show less

This study examines non-completion of Year 12 at school for a nationally representative sample of young people who were 15 years old and still attending school in 2003. The study explores relationships between non-completion and selected socio-demographic and school-related factors, and changes in rates of school non-completion from the early 1980s to 2005. There is a particular emphasis on how socio-demographic and school-related factors over that period have influenced early school leaving. This study also examines the use of an alternative measure of 'school completion', which incorporates participation in a vocational education and training (VET) program after leaving school. Show less

In 2000, ACER introduced cohort reports as part of its Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) program to 'provide an overview of the education, training and labour market experiences of the whole cohort on a regular basis, contributing to discussions of issues that affect young people'. Cohort reports supplement data already available from government statistics on enrolments and apparent retention rates. These reports are aimed at helping researchers to see the potential of the database as they use a wider range of the variables than may be used in the LSAY research reports.

This report contains information about the experiences of the 1995 LSAY cohort in 1999. Information on this cohort was first collected in 1995, when these young people were Year 9 students in Australian schools. The modal age of respondents at the time of the 2002 survey was 18 years and almost all of the cohort had left secondary school and had commenced further education, employment or some combination of activities. Key features of the background characteristics of the cohort are: two per cent were of Indigenous background; 89% came from a home in which English was the main language spoken; 68% had attended a government school in Year 9, 20% had attended a Catholic school and 12% had attended an Independent school; 55% had a home address in a metropolitan area in 1995, 24% lived in regional centres, and 21% had a home address in a rural or remote area; and 49% had a father who worked in a professional, para-professional or managerial occupation, and 16% had a father who worked as a plant or machine operator, or a labourer. The contents are: Introduction; Who is in the Year 9 class of 1995?; Education and work activities; Living arrangements and other activities; Concluding remarks; References.

Other cohort reports relating to the Year 9 class of 1995 are indexed at TD/TNC 78.211, TD/TNC 78.213 and TD/TNC 78.214. Show less