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LSAY briefing, produced by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), is a series which aims to provide summaries of findings from ACER research and to identify some of the implications for policy and further research. It is based on data from ACER's Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) project and key LSAY reports. This issue, which examines the main pathways by which Australian youth move from school to work, highlights that: the school-to-work pathways in Australia are highly diverse and individualised; by the mid-1990s, 43% of Year 10 students from the late 1980s had obtained either a university degree or a TAFE diploma or were studying for one of these qualifications; tertiary qualifications had considerable influence in maintaining full-time employment; the majority of school leavers without tertiary qualifications spend most of their first seven post-school years in full-time work; about 16% of male Year 10 students and 20% of female students had problematic pathways; young people whose main after school activity in the first year was either an apprenticeship, full-time employment or full-time study were more likely to experience successful pathways.

This brief is based on a paper presented at the Australian Centre conference in Potsdam, Germany in May 2000, which was organised by the Monash University-ACER Centre for the Economics of Education and Training (CEET). The paper, which was published as CEET working paper no. 31, is indexed at TD/TNC 62.35. Show less

This paper examines the role of interest in learning and career development. It is based on the view that one's interest is a major factor in educational achievement. Moreover, interest continues to play a substantial role in career throughout the life span. Interest is related to work adjustment and is a key feature of job satisfaction for many individuals. Most people would be prepared to acknowledge that interest is important for learning and working, yet they may not have a clear understanding of the extent of that influence or the extent to which it is able to be expressed. There is enough evidence to suggest that course offerings in secondary schools are widespread (well over 300 courses) but not focused. An important issue is to what extent courses should reflect the world of work - there is an argument that education should be quarantined from this function. Ultimately it is a policy question about the nature and purpose of education. 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, the third in a series of annual reports on the activities of the Year 9 class of 1998 in the LSAY project, provides information about the experiences of the cohort in 2001. Highlights from this report include: 80% of the cohort were still attending secondary school; 10% of the cohort were engaged in other study, including study at a TAFE or some other educational institution or in an apprenticeship; 23% of school students were undertaking some sort of vocational education and training (VET); of all cohort members who were no longer at school, 47% were in full-time or part-time study, or in an apprenticeship or traineeship; 56% of the cohort were employed in 2001, with nearly 45% working part-time and nearly 12% working full-time; of those cohort members still at secondary school, 51% were employed; among cohort members no longer at school, males worked an average of 37 hours and earned $324 each week, and females worked an average of 31 hours and earned $243 per week; 45% of all cohort members received some form of workplace training in their jobs, with more than one-half of full-time workers receiving training; and cohort members still at school scored higher than those no longer at school on a measure of curiosity, and lower on a scale of interest in work skills - female members scored slightly higher on the curiosity measure, but there were no differences on the work skills measure. The contents are: Executive summary; Introduction; The Year 9 class of 1998 in 2001; Education and training; Employment; General attitudes and activities; Concluding comments; References.

Cohort reports relating to the Year 9 class of 1998 are indexed at TD/TNC 78.212, TD/TNC 78.215, TD/TNC 78.218, TD/TNC 78.219 and TD/TNC 91.562. 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 1998 LSAY cohort in 1999. Information on this cohort was first collected in 1998, when these young people were Year 9 students in Australian schools. Almost 99% of the students who were surveyed in 1999 were still in school. Key features of the background characteristics of the cohort in 1999 were: about two per cent of students were of Indigenous background; nine in 10 students were born in Australia; almost one-third had a father born in a country other than Australia and just fewer than three in 10 had a mother born in a country other than Australia; in around one in 10 households, a language other than English was regularly spoken; and around half of their mothers and fathers had completed secondary school. The contents are: Introduction; The Year 9 class of 1998: who are they?; Those in school; Early school leavers; Concluding remarks; References.

Cohort reports relating to the Year 9 class of 1998 are indexed at TD/TNC 78.212, TD/TNC 78.215, TD/TNC 78.218, TD/TNC 78.219 and TD/TNC 91.562. Show less

LSAY briefing, produced by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), is a series which aims to provide summaries of findings from ACER research and to identify some of the implications for policy and further research. It is based on data from ACER's Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) project and key LSAY reports. This issue, which focuses on the labour force experiences of secondary school students in Australia, highlights that: students who undertake short work experience programs benefit in terms of learning skills appropriate to a particular job; work placement programs encourage some students to complete their schooling; part-time jobs are perceived as being useful for developing general employment skills; part-time jobs of less than 10 hours a week do not affect academic performance of Years 11 and 12 students; and students with part-time jobs are less likely to be unemployed at age 19 than those who did not work part-time while at secondary school. Show less

This paper discusses the context of learning about work in secondary schools: growth in participation in the upper secondary school years, high levels of youth unemployment, fewer opportunities for students to learn employment-related skills through working in a job, fewer opportunities to interact with a range of adults, a longer period of economic dependency and emphasis on the context in which learning takes place. Successful programs designed to teach thinking skills, learning skills and higher-order cognitive skills incorporate three key features: characteristics of out-of-school learning (shared intellectual work and joining accomplishment tasks), aspects of apprenticeships and a basis in particular bodies of knowledge rather than general abilities. Different countries use different ways of introducing this learning, such as part-time work for full-time students, work experience programs, school-industry programs, vocational education programs, and job placement. Issues raised include monitoring labour market outcomes for the various forms of learning about work and the quality of learning in the workplace. Show less

Cohort reports were introduced as part of the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) program in 2000 to provide an overview of the education, training and labour market experiences of the whole cohort on a regular basis. They 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 provides details of the Y03 cohort in 2004 in terms of their background characteristics, education and training, employment, social activities and attitudes. Information on this cohort was first collected in 2003 when these young people participated in OECD's Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).

Y03 cohort reports are indexed from TD/TNC 91.559 to TD/TNC 91.561. Show less

This report, based on data collected in the Y95 cohort of the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY-95), analyses the effects of part-time work on participation and attrition in secondary school and in tertiary study as well as on the post school activities of young people. It is structured as follows: chapter one contains the introduction; chapter two presents an analysis of the impact of part-time work on Year 12 completion; chapter three focuses on the main activities of students after they leave school; chapter four covers tertiary study; chapter five examines the impact of work on dropout from tertiary study; and the final chapter provides a summary of the main findings and considers the nature of the impact of work on the lives and progress of the students. The main findings include: working one to five hours per week during Year 9 does not make any difference to the likelihood of completing Year 12, although working more than five hours a week increases the likelihood of dropping out before completing Year 12, especially for males; the greater the number of hours students work, the greater their likelihood of dropping out; Year 9 female students who work part-time are much more likely to complete Year 12 than their male counterparts; and, Year 9 male students who work more than 15 hours a week are approximately 60% less likely to complete Year 12. Show less

'Improving the Foundations for Lifelong Learning in Secondary Schools' is an Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) project that addresses the question of what secondary schools can do to help their students develop lifelong learning skills and attitudes. This report is one of two publications resulting from the project. The aim of this report is to show how the issues outlined in the first paper (indexed at TD/TNC 66.81) can be put into practice in Australian secondary schools. The report considers: what it means to be, or become, a lifelong learner at secondary school and how secondary schools can be assisted to orient themselves towards lifelong learning. The contents are: Executive summary; Introduction; What makes a lifelong learning school different?; What militates against a school becoming oriented to lifelong learning?; How do you start the 'lifelong learning' process in a school?; Another approach: the views of students returning to study; Conclusions; How far is the school on the journey to lifelong learning?; Methodology. The following case studies are also included: Birdwood High School; Caroline Chisholm Catholic College; Tallangatta Secondary College; St. Aloysius College; Marden Senior College. Included as appendices are: The Journey to Becoming a Lifelong Learning School; Questionnaire; Interview Schedule: Principal; Interview Schedule: Teachers. Show less

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is an initiative of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). It was implemented for the OECD by an international consortium led by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). ACER also conducted the PISA survey within Australia. PISA is a new survey of the knowledge and skills of 15-year-olds mainly in industrialised countries. The survey seeks to determine: how well students are prepared for future challenges; which skills they have to help them to adapt to change in their lives, e.g. the ability to analyse, reason and communicate their arguments and ideas to others; whether some ways of organising schools and learning within them are more effective than others; if the quality of school resources has an influence on students' learning; and the extent to which student performance is dependent on their home backgrounds and ways to improve learning opportunities for students from disadvantaged backgrounds. PISA assesses the learning domains of reading, mathematical and scientific literacy along with some other areas such as students' familiarity with computers, their learning strategies, and their attitudes towards their schools. The first of a planned three-yearly cycle of assessments was undertaken in 32 countries (28 OECD member countries and four non-member countries that chose to participate) during the year 2000 in randomly selected samples of schools and students. This Australian national report describes PISA and how it developed, the details of Australia's participation, and the Australian results in both the national and international context. It presents insights into the factors affecting the development of students' reading, mathematical and scientific skills at home and at school and discusses the implications of the results for future policy development. Key information from the international report is incorporated in this report to provide Australian readers with a broad perspective of PISA.

The summary of the full Australian report is indexed at TD/TNC 69.533 and the international report is indexed at TD/TNC 67.328. Show less