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The number of mature-age Australians registered with employment services is growing, with mature-age jobseekers spending longer unemployed and on income support than younger jobseekers. However, the role of employment services in extending working lives has so far received little attention in policy discourses on ageing and employment. This article examines the effectiveness of Australia's employment services system in supporting mature-age jobseekers, drawing upon interviews conducted as part of wider research on unemployment and underemployment in mature-age. [The authors] find that the overriding experience among mature-age jobseekers is of a system that exudes 'carelessness'. [The authors] situate mature-age jobseekers' experiences of systemic carelessness within the context of wider welfare reforms that have contributed to the de-professionalisation and routinisation of employment services' delivery.

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Strengthening the practice of meaningful youth engagement, including in youth employment programs, reflects a growing acknowledgement of young people's role and need to be engaged in decisions affecting their lives. While still understudied, there is increasing awareness among funders of youth engagement's added value to programs, particularly in increasing a program's responsiveness and quality, as well as longer-term benefits resulting from the engagement of young people in various stages of the program life cycle. This document has been developed to guide and equip funders and stakeholders with tools and information to support the integration of meaningful youth engagement into youth employment programming and strategies. To do so, the paper outlines why meaningful youth engagement is important, what meaningful youth engagement is and how it could be embedded across various stages of the program life cycle, as well as within a funder's strategy and culture. Bearing in mind that funders are at different stages of their journeys, the heterogeneity of young people and the wide range of youth employment program interventions, the roadmap's recommendations are both immediately actionable and aspirational.

This paper is the result of the analysis carried out by Plan International. The roadmap identifies the 'who,' 'why,' 'when' and, most importantly, 'how' when it comes to involving young people as partners in youth employment programming. It has been developed to support funders and practitioners in their efforts to embed youth voices and rights into their programming by considering two key research questions: (1) What are the key phases of youth engagement in the planning, governance, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of youth employment programs? (2) What concrete steps can youth employment funders take to strengthen their own youth engagement strategies?

The roadmap is divided into several interconnected sections: an Introduction section, which frames the discussion in subsequent sections; the Research Methodology and Summary of Findings section, which outlines the methodology that directed our approach and a summary of data collection findings; the Defining Meaningful Youth Engagement in Youth Employment Programs section, which proposes a definition for meaningful youth engagement and presents a framework to operationalize this concept in youth employment programs; and a Roadmap to Meaningful Youth Engagement in Action section, which builds on the framework by providing entry points for mainstreaming meaningful youth engagement in programs - these come in the form of milestones and action steps per program life-cycle stage and into organizational strategies.

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In this study, twelve young students on the autism spectrum were interviewed on preparation for working life, employment guidance, the challenges and strengths of the autism spectrum, and suitable teaching methods. Interviews were supported by a structured and illustrated questionnaire. The data were analysed using key statistics. The results showed that, from the students' perspective, the most important issues in preparation for work are familiarisation with different jobs, guidance in searching for a suitable job, evaluation of the suitability of the working environment, integration of occupational safety into work skills, and acquiring conversational skills in the workplace. The selection of a suitable working environment is clearly emphasised before transitioning to work. Acquiring and keeping a job require investing in social situations and skills in studying. The structuring should be flexible and adaptable according to situations and personal needs. Educationally, social interaction, social skills, and communication should form a coherent whole. The main goal for everyday life ought to be communicative and based on a structure for acquiring different skills. The results can be utilised in a vocational education and training (VET) context because they support the importance of preparatory education as part of these studies. In addition, the results can also be used in on-the-job learning plans for VET.

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In order to enable as many young people with different educational conditions and levels of performance to succeed from school to further education, we need data from the authentic perspective of companies that refer to specific occupations and specific areas of education. The main purpose of the presented survey is to provide data and information out of the authentic view of enterprises in different areas of occupation about needed competences and skills in specific professions. The purpose of this study is not to copy a concept like 'Ausbildungsreife', the results should give support for students, teachers, parents, trainers in companies, entrepreneurs used as a tool within a comprehensive occupational orientation and career development process to support smooth transition processes from school into world of [vocational education and training] VET into companies and labour market.

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The volume from which this paper is taken is available in VOCEDplus at TD/TNC 151.801. Show less

Introduction: The early closure of the Voluntary Dental Graduate Year Program and the Oral Health Therapy Graduate Year Program by the Australian Government adversely impacted New South Wales (NSW) Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services (ACCHSs). This led to the co-design of a small-scale oral health therapy graduate year program for ACCHSs known as the Dalang Project, which enabled oral health therapists to engage with local Aboriginal communities and implement culturally competent, practical and evidence-based oral health promotion activities. This article provides an overview of the Dalang Project and its evaluation.

Methods: All graduates of the Dalang Project were invited via email and social media to complete an online survey. The survey included questions about their year in the Dalang Project, why they applied, what they liked and disliked about the project, where they planned to work post-placement, and examples of the most significant changes they observed in the communities where they were placed. Host sites were also surveyed and data were collated on clinical services performed as well as oral health promotion activity.

Results: Prior to commencing the Dalang Project only 4 of the 15 respondents came from rural or regional areas. Nine of the 15 respondents were considering working in a regional, rural or remote area prior to applying for the Dalang Project. Twelve respondents were working at the time of the survey and half were working in regional, rural or remote locations in NSW and one in the Northern Territory. All reported that they would be more likely to work in an ACCHS as a result of being a part of the Dalang Project. The majority of respondents said they would recommend the program to future graduates. A total of 63 schools, 21 preschools and 15 community health services received regular dental health education through the Dalang Project. A total of 3250 toothbrushes and fluoride toothpastes were distributed to children and families through the Dalang Project. A key part of the program was the installation of refrigerated and filtered water fountains in schools where there was no free filtered or refrigerated water supply. The inclusion of this component in the program was part of the co-design process and links the program to the wider population health strategies in NSW to help prevent childhood obesity.

Conclusion: The Dalang Project is an example of a successful co-designed project that has positively impacted oral health service delivery for Aboriginal children and has provided a valuable experience for new graduate oral health therapists working in ACCHSs. Overall, the Dalang Project was found to be a positive professional experience for the oral health therapists with many remaining in rural, remote and regional locations after completing the program.

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Blended learning which synthesizes face-to-face instruction with distance education opportunities in educationally meaningful ways aims to take advantage of the affordances of both genuine and virtual types of teaching and ubiquitously equip learners without the limitation of time and space. Blended learning has been integrated into several pre-service teacher education courses to soundly cultivate teacher candidates with the efficient use of online and class time. Yet, to date, there has been no research on the use of blended learning in English as a lingua franca (ELF)-aware pre-service teacher education. This study aims to introduce an intensive blended learning model devised to raise ELF-awareness of pre-service teachers via critical reflection and investigate its effectiveness through their views. The data were collected by a questionnaire with closed- and open-ended items and semi-structured interviews and analyzed via quantitative and qualitative analysis. The findings showed the blended learning model was rated to be effective in raising ELF-awareness of the participants. The advantages of the model were also reported along with challenges and the ways to address them. Overall, the results indicate a high level of satisfaction about the model and it is suggested blended learning be used in pre-service teacher education contexts.

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The alignment of educational outcomes with workforce needs plays an essential role in promoting both individual socioeconomic mobility and national economic growth and competitiveness. Achieving and sustaining this alignment requires ongoing dialogue between educators and employers about what constitutes workforce preparedness. What do graduates need to know and be able to do in order to succeed in the workplaces of today and tomorrow, and how does a college education enable or contribute to the development of a shared knowledge base and skill set? This report presents findings from an online survey that was conducted in October 2020 by the Association of American Colleges and Universities in partnership with Hanover Research.

The total respondent sample of 496 included equal numbers of executives and hiring managers who are responsible for making hiring and promotion decisions in US companies of various types and sizes across a wide range of industries. The report is organized into two parts. The findings presented in part one focus on employer views and perceptions related to higher education, in general, and the goals of an undergraduate liberal education, in particular. Part one also includes findings related to mindsets and personal qualities that, while not commonly included in listings of expected outcomes of college-level learning, nonetheless play an important role in individual success in both college and the workplace. Part two of this report presents significant differences that appeared in the survey results in relation to respondent age and educational attainment. Most notably, the survey results point to the possible emergence of a generation gap that may lead over time to greater confidence in higher education, greater support for liberal education, and greater recognition of the value of the civic-related outcomes of college education.

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In the health sector, cross-cultural awareness training has been seen as a way to improve knowledge and understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to therefore improve service delivery and therapeutic care to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Health personnel may have undertaken this type of training in their workplace or as part of their education in an undergraduate degree program. Other sectors additionally undertake cross-cultural awareness training for similar reasons and in similar educational settings. This paper includes the views of a selection of Aboriginal women and highlights the need to extend beyond knowledge gained through cross-cultural awareness training to anti-racism training. Furthermore, that anti-racism training and addressing white race privilege is required in order to address the inequities within the health system, and the marginalisation and disempowerment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

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This paper describes an exploratory study on the perceived value of higher education by Chinese students in Macao SAR [China: Special Administrative Region], Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Taipei. Using responses from 316 students, we find that the Sheth-Newman-Gross Theory of Consumption Values explains how students perceive the services offered by higher education institutions. Students have different opinions on the value items, which we group into two functional values (the usefulness of a degree and the experiential aspect), social value, emotional value, epistemic value, and conditional value using factor analysis. A stepwise multiple regression analysis shows that students' satisfaction depends, to a large extent, on two functional values - the experiential aspect and the usefulness of a degree. Moreover, when comparing value judgments based on gender as well as other demographic and social variables, the results show no significant differences between the mean scores in perceived values. Implications for delivering effective educational services in higher education conclude the paper.

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This report covers: Vocational education and training policy priorities; The training market situation in 2015; Vocational training policy measures and programmes; International vocational training cooperation - current status and future prospects; Opinion of the Board of the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training on the draft of this report.

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