Special vocation?: association between caring for someone with a disability and probability of completing a vocational qualification among the Indigenous population

Questions about the extent to which informal caring responsibilities affect participation in education and educational attainment are important to many policy areas. Policy development in areas of formal child care, aged care, disability services, paid parental leave, family-friendly policies in workplaces, female labour force participation and gender equity can be informed by evidence of how caring affects educational participation and attainment. This is particularly true for women, who bear the brunt of providing informal care in Australian society. Indigenous Australians are more...  [+] Show more

Questions about the extent to which informal caring responsibilities affect participation in education and educational attainment are important to many policy areas. Policy development in areas of formal child care, aged care, disability services, paid parental leave, family-friendly policies in workplaces, female labour force participation and gender equity can be informed by evidence of how caring affects educational participation and attainment. This is particularly true for women, who bear the brunt of providing informal care in Australian society. Indigenous Australians are more likely to have informal caring responsibilities than non-Indigenous Australians, with contributing factors including higher fertility rates, higher rates of disability and poorer access to formal care services. Peak fertility for Indigenous women is in the 15-24 year age group, a time when many young people complete secondary education and embark on post-school education. Vocational education remains the predominant form of post-school educational engagement among Indigenous Australians, despite increasing numbers participating in higher education. Yet there is little research examining relationships between caring responsibilities and Indigenous people's participation in vocational education and attainment of vocational qualifications.

The release of the Australian Census Longitudinal Dataset (ACLD) by the Australian Bureau of Statistics provides a valuable opportunity to examine outcomes for the Indigenous population in 2011 in the light of their circumstances in 2006. Longitudinal data - information relating to the same individuals over a period of time - can support analyses of individual transitions, yielding clearer insights into social processes. Using cross-sectional census data to assess change over time in outcomes for the Indigenous population is additionally challenging because of changing Indigenous identification. This means that when using census data to compare average outcomes of the Indigenous population in 2011 with 2006 (for example), we do not know the extent to which those who identified as being Indigenous in 2011 are the same people (after taking births and deaths into account) as those who identified as being Indigenous in 2006. Changes in identification might therefore be driving any observed change in average outcomes for the population, resulting in misleading conclusions about whether outcomes are improving or worsening. Longitudinal information can help to address this problem because, even if people change identification, groups (however these groups are delineated) comprising the same individuals over time can be analysed. The ACLD provides a relatively large Indigenous sample (about 22,000 people who were identified as Indigenous in 2006).

The research presented here draws on multivariate analysis using the ACLD to examine how Indigenous people's caring responsibilities in 2006 were associated with their subsequent entry into TAFE and attainment of their first educational qualification. The analysis examines whether caring for children and caring for someone with a disability have different associations with vocational education participation and attainment. The presentation will conclude with a consideration of some policy implications and reflections on the strengths and limitations of the ACLD for this type of research.

Published abstract.