Competency-based training Australian style: how it exposes VET to risk

Drawing on twenty-five years of research and practice in competency-based training in Australia by the author, the paper shows how competency-based training (CBT) lays the VET system open to poor quality and unethical practice, even to corruption. There has been ongoing controversy about CBT in Australia since its widespread adoption in the early 1990s. While CBT has brought benefits, it has also brought problems. Many of the problems foreseen by commentators at the time of its introduction have been realised, but unforeseen problems have arisen. The research question for the paper is 'How does CBT as it is practised in Australia expose the VET sector to risk?' The paper analyses a number of key features in vocational education and training (VET) in Australia which are attributable to the adoption of competency-based training. These include: the nature of Training Packages; the lack of prescription of delivery mode or delivery hours; whether competency-based training is compatible with on-line learning; the nature of competency-based assessment and recognition of prior learning; and CBT's alignment with funding systems.

The paper argues that the lack of prescription once seen as a positive feature of CBT Australian-style has become a fundamental quality problem, which layer upon layer of additional regulation has not succeeded in addressing. The risk is compounded by ongoing marketisation of the VET system over the past 25 years and more. Some of the analysis for this paper was initially undertaken by the author in preparation for a court case in which [she] was called as an expert witness. While the court case itself cannot be discussed, the analysis process, which is developed further in this paper, led to a sobering realisation of the extent to which CBT has put the VET system at risk.

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