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The Aboriginal Peoples Survey (APS) is a national survey on the social and economic conditions of First Nations people living off reserve, Metis and Inuit aged 6 years and over. The objectives of the APS are to identify the needs of these Aboriginal groups and to inform policy and programs aimed at improving the well-being of Aboriginal peoples. The APS has been conducted by Statistics Canada since 1991, providing a range of social and economic indicators about Aboriginal peoples. This cycle of the APS was conducted from February 6, 2012 to July 30, 2012. Over 50,000 people were selected to participate in the survey and the final response rate was 76 per cent. The survey design allowed for the production of reliable data for each of the provinces and territories (Atlantic provinces grouped), as well as for each of the four Inuit regions: Nunatsiavut (Northern coastal Labrador), Nunavik (Northern Quebec), the territory of Nunavut and the Inuvialuit region of the Northwest Territories. The survey also targeted four particular education groups: current school attendees in grades one to six; current school attendees in grades seven to 12; high school completers (including equivalency); and high school leavers. This guide is intended to provide a detailed review of the 2012 APS with respect to its subject matter and methodological approaches. It is designed to assist APS data users by serving as a guide to the concepts and measures of the survey as well as the technical details of the survey's design, field work and data processing. The guide is meant to provide users with helpful information on how to use and interpret survey results. The discussion on data quality also allows users to review the strengths and limitations of the data for their particular needs. Show less

The Northern Territory government commissioned an independent review of Indigenous education in 2013 to get an informed understanding of the impact of current programs and initiatives. The scope of this review includes assessing the impact of Australian and Northern Territory government expenditure to improve education outcomes for Indigenous students in the Northern Territory, from both a remote and urban area perspective. It will also assess the effectiveness of programs and initiatives directed at school attendance, teaching and learning approaches, the Indigenous education workforce partnership and approaches for greater community involvement in education. Following research and consultation with key stakeholders and the general public, this draft report has been prepared to present the findings and recommendations for the future of Indigenous Education in the Northern Territory. The final version of the report, due in March 2014, will include further appendices containing more detailed data about some aspects of Indigenous education in the Northern Territory.

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Student debt burdens are weighing on the economic fortunes of younger Americans, as households headed by young adults owing student debt lag far behind their peers in terms of wealth accumulation. This report presents an economic and demographic portrait of households headed by persons younger than 40 and owing student debt. It compares them to similar households that do not have outstanding student loan balances. The analysis is based on the Survey of Consumer Finances, which also provides a richer demographic context than is available in credit report data.

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[The authors] examine time trends, precursors and continuity of poverty during youth and young adulthood in Germany. Although Germany’s labour market performed well during the recent economic crisis, this occurred against the backdrop of growing social inequality and strong increase in the risk of poverty, especially among youth and young adults. Based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study, [the authors] propose a method to take into account inter-generational support by virtually pooling the income of residentially independent children and their parents.

[The authors] show that poverty risks are differentially related to the ‘big five’ transitions to adulthood. Leaving the parental home and entering unemployment strongly increase poverty risks, whereas cohabitation and employment in the higher labour market segments are strong protectors against poverty. The transition to parenthood, educational participation and precarious employment are not consistently related to poverty risk once inter-generational support is taken into account. While enrollment at university has a positive impact on poverty when residentially independent children are considered economically independent, this effect disappears with adjustment for parental resources. Whereas the impact of youth transitions does not change over time, social background has a strong and increasing impact on poverty risks. Social background and poverty experiences during youth strongly affect poverty risks later in life, although life course continuity weakens through the period of youth transitions.

Overall, these results clearly point towards the increasing importance of social background and inequality in affecting the risk of poverty during the transition to adulthood.

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Transition to higher education (HE) is a significant life event and it is supposed to be a very agreeable experience to students. However, such impact is not linear, being mediated by students' psychosocial variables and by their own perceptions concerning the HE environment. Transition to HE encompasses many tasks to cope with changes: dealing with new kinds of responsibilities and managing emotions. A wide variety of emotions take place in the HE transition, either of a positive or negative nature, such as joy of enrolment, success and fears of social rejection. This research focused on the transition to HE, approaching freshmen's personal and developmental variables. Results confirm that the impact of transition has a mostly emotional nature and that related concerns differ according to students' gender and socio-cultural background. With greater joy or greater anxiety, HE transition may be perceived as a stage of a long process towards adulthood.

Published abstract reprinted by permission of the copyright owner. Show less

Job quality indexes are constructed on the basis of such aspects of working conditions as earnings, prospects, working time, and intrinsic job quality. Occupations where job quality is consistently low are labelled 'occupations with multiple disadvantages'. This report uses data from the fifth European Working Conditions Survey to identify such occupations. It finds that workers in mid-skilled manual and low-skilled occupations do quite poorly when it comes to earnings, prospects and intrinsic job quality, and they report relatively low levels of both physical and mental well-being. However, their working time quality is generally good. In contrast, workers in high-skilled occupations do relatively well on almost all job quality indicators, except working time.

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This report is based on data from a wide range of resources and explores the trajectory of the West Australian labour market: where it has come from; where it currently stands; where it is headed; and where it could go. The report is divided into two main sections. Part one examines current patterns and trends of the West Australian workforce and what future industry and workforce scenarios may look like as the economy transitions. Particular attention has been paid to youth unemployment, the important role of labour mobility and how outcomes vary geographically. Part two examines current issues around maximising Western Australia's workforce potential, including labour underutilisation, equity in labour market outcomes and the overall wellbeing of the state's workers. Gender equity and Indigenous participation are considered closely, as well as the difficult balancing act between work and family. Key findings are grouped under the following headings: a comparative picture of the West Australian workforce (with the rest of Australia); the labour market in transition; skills and education; equality of labour market opportunity; and work, wellbeing and happiness.

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This report examines four scenarios of social partner cooperation in the hairdressing sector, aimed at improving the quality of work and employment. The scenarios are based on trends that reveal high impact and high uncertainty qualities, such as the re-evaluation of the sector as a craft sector, technological change, the effects of climate change, and the polarisation of the sector due to the dominance of shopping malls. These scenarios, which were developed on the basis of desk research, interviews with national social partners and focus groups of the sectoral social partners, are then mapped onto the four main quality of work indicators, as defined by [European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions] Eurofound (career and employment security, skills development, reconciliation of working and non-working life, and health and well-being), in order to formulate policy pointers for how the social partners could develop strategies to improve the quality of work and employment in the future.

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The Australian Government believes there is a real opportunity to make a difference in the lives of Indigenous Australians, and the best way to do that is through real jobs. To address this Andrew Forrest was asked to lead a review of Indigenous training and employment programmes. The review's purpose was to provide recommendations to ensure Indigenous training and employment services are properly targeted and administered to connect unemployed Indigenous people with real and sustainable jobs, especially those that have been pledged to Indigenous people by Australian business. The review considered ways that training and employment services can better link to the commitment of employers to provide further sustainable employment opportunities for Indigenous people and finally end the cycle of entrenched Indigenous disadvantage.

In making its recommendations, the review considered the following issues:(1) creating sustainable employment outcomes, i.e. the best models for supporting sustainable employment outcomes and the key drivers of 'training for training's sake; and (2) programme effectiveness and costs, i.e. the value of training and employment policies and programmes for Indigenous people, the interaction between mainstream and Indigenous training and employment services, and accountability and information. The review involved consultation with the public around Australia, listening to ideas about improvements that could be made to help create parity between Indigenous Australians and other Australians. Over 300 submissions were made as part of these original consultations.

The recommendations are reported under the following areas: (1) prenatal, early childhood and education (early childhood, school attendance, improving educational outcomes, stopping distractions to education); (2) the healthy welfare card; (3) implementation and accountability; (4) breaking the welfare cycle (young people, job seeker obligations); (5) building capability, dismantling the cash barbeque and eliminating disincentives (tax incentives, employment services, vocational education and training, driver's licences, training in incarceration); (6) incentives for housing and mobility; (7) building employer demand (government procurement, top 200 employers, support for employers, public sector employment); and (8) empowering people in remote communities to end the disparity themselves (remote job centres, local governance, consolidating service delivery, remote housing, enabling leasing or freeholding of Indigenous land, land access payments).

Andrew Forrest's key message from the review is: 'Seismic, not incremental, change is required and the time for action is now. These solutions are not expensive and parity is completely achievable with the strength of will from each of us'.

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The Neighbourhood Employment Programme (NEP) is a locally developed initiative, designed to support residents into work through tailored support on skills development at job clubs. The NEP draws on expertise from within the Regeneration Team at Milton Keynes Council, Adult Continuing Education (ACE), Milton Keynes College, Job Centre Plus, MK Mind, IXION and other community agencies. The NEP is designed to engage unemployed individuals who live across 22 regeneration areas in Milton Keynes, [England]. This report presents the results of a one-year evaluation of the NEP. The aims of the research were to understand the effectiveness of the NEP as a means of improving access to employment; to assess the appropriateness of the design of the NEP; and to evaluate the impact of the NEP.

The NEP had supported 20 per cent of clients to move into employment and supported many others to move closer to the labour market. It generated positive changes in terms of skills and well-being for clients supported by the job clubs. Clients attributed a high level of their success in getting ready to find work, to the job clubs. Overall, clients were very happy with the support and found the job clubs and advisers to be beneficial to their journey to employment.

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