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The consortium 'Supporting vocational education and training providers in building capability for the future' undertook a two-year program of work which focused on approaches intended to help vocational education and training (VET) providers to build their capability. This publication summaries the work undertaken by the consortium of researchers investigating how VET organisations are building capability in an environment of ongoing change. Show less

In the 1990s, one of Australia's police services moved from a centralised, academy-based system of training towards a more integrated model of professional development. As a consequence, probationary constables spent reduced time in the police academy (6 months) before moving into the workplace for 18 months of work-based learning. This paper explores how those changes affected the ways in which probationary constables are viewed and accepted into the workforce. A useful model for this exploration is that of legitimate peripheral participation, as advocated by Lave and Wenger in 1991. Although Lave and Wenger acknowledge that peripherality, rather than being a negative term, allows for an understanding of inclusion into a community of practice, there is still a long journey to be travelled before full acceptance is accorded to the newcomer. By exploring the 'voices' of the probationers and their senior officers, the conflicts and difficulties that arose during their work-based probation and the negotiations required to help develop competent police officers, it is possible to trace the journey of probationary constables from periphery to a more central acceptance. This paper explores how the probationary constables were viewed and accepted into the workforce to become full and trusted members of a community of practice.

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

The VOCEDplus landmark documents are key documents considered by history and authoritative commentary to have influenced the development of the Australian vocational education and training (VET) system, providing vision and/or leading to significant change. This paper is part of a series of forthcoming overviews that analyse and describe how these landmark documents impacted on the development of various aspects of Australia's VET sector.

This paper provides an overview of the Australian VET workforce since 1969. It analyses reasons for the dearth of information about the workforce, and then focuses on three main questions: what is known about the VET workforce, what capabilities does it require to carry out its roles effectively, and how can it be most appropriately prepared and developed? It concludes that many issues raised by four early landmark reports are still to be resolved, and perhaps they never will be, given the very nature of VET and the multitude of expectations from its diverse stakeholders. It focuses on the following landmark documents: The training of skilled workers in Europe: report of Australian Tripartite Mission 1968-69 [Tregillis report] (TD/LMR 85.640); TAFE in Australia: report on needs in technical and further education [Kangan report] (TD/LMR 85.637); Formal preparation of TAFE teachers in Australia: a report to the Council by the Staff Development Advisory Committee [Fleming report] (TD/LMR 85.662); Education, training and employment: report of the Committee of Inquiry into Education and Training [Williams report] (TD/LMR 85.677). Show less

This preliminary review of literature on VET staff development underpins a national project exploring links between employment modes and staff development. Three key themes are distilled: changing VET context, increasing non-standard employment and shifting models of staff development. The paper then explores issues arising from each of these themes.

Published abstract.

The volume of collected papers is indexed at TD/TNC 60.88. Show less

This study explored the changing role of staff development for vocational education and training (VET) teachers and trainers in Australian public and private registered training organisations (RTOs). Substantial reforms in the VET sector over the past decade have had considerable impact on the work of teachers and trainers. In this context of rapid change, the nature, direction, delivery, access and funding responsibility of staff development are undergoing transformation. The purpose of the research, therefore, was to examine current staff development provisions, research a range of issues relating to the staff development of VET teachers and trainers and make recommendations in the light of the new education and training environment. Show less

The term community of practice (CoP) was developed in the early 1990s to describe a mode of social learning. The Australian vocational education and training (VET) sector has undergone considerable reform over the past 15 years. One aspect of this reform is that VET teachers have been increasingly encouraged to provide training in the workplace. In this chapter, the authors examine the ways in which a group of VET teachers learned how to work in companies and navigate the spaces between CoPs in the company and those in their home institute. The discussion draws on 24 interviews in six case studies, each one comprising a VET institute and a company. The findings reveal how CoPs could be used as an explanatory framework to help teachers make meaning of their work with industry, and of the challenges they face as they move between different sites of practice.

The volume from which this chapter is taken is indexed at TD/TNC 96.640. Selected individual chapters are indexed from TD/TNC 96.739 to TD/TNC 96.746. Show less

This study aims to describe and interpret the critical aspects of the development of PhD candidates' professionally relevant, practice-near research competence in the fields of health, welfare and education. To provide knowledge regarding their development, a qualitative research design and phenomenological hermeneutic approach were used. Ten PhD candidates at a Norwegian multi-disciplinary research school were recruited through non-probability sampling. The following four themes emerged from the analysis: (1) relinquishing the professional status as a practitioner, (2) struggling at a low level of competence, (3) achieving autonomy as a PhD candidate, and (4) wanting to advance professional practice. The PhD candidates experienced loss when they relinquished their former professional status to become researchers while simultaneously struggling at a low level of competence compared to that of other qualified researchers. Thus, the importance of achieving autonomy to advance professional practice cannot be too strongly emphasised when PhD candidates are newcomers in a peripheral position within research communities.

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This paper examines the significance of professional development programmes in enabling vocational education and training (VET) practitioners to adjust to rapid policy changes. As a background to the research the authors outline some of the success factors that have been identified in recent literature, focusing on the need to integrate organisational and personal imperatives. The paper then draws on a set of ten case studies in order to analyse the relationship between professional development programmes and change implementation. Three dimensions of professional development practice are identified: the degree of integration with or separation from normal work activity; the degree of group or individual responsibility for development and change in general; and the extent to which a programme is generic or specifically tailored to individual needs. From this analysis, the authors derive four types of programme that have been accepted as effective within their context: Just-as-planned; Just-in-case; Just-in-time; and Just-for-me. The authors conclude by speculating whether a capacity to cope with change in general is more useful than training to specific and possibly unstable objectives.

The volume of collected proceedings is indexed at TD/TNC 57.76; individual papers are indexed from TD/TNC 57.77 to TD/TNC 57.122. Show less

In Australia and overseas, relationships between employers and the employed continue to be transformed. As a result, the concept of career can no longer be defined through a single lifestage, vocational choice or lifetime employer/organisation. Rather, labour market conditions created by various factors (impacts of globalisation, information technology growth and a diversification of the workforce coupled with regulation or deregulation, privatisation, competition and a shift in traditional work from manufacturing to service/technology) has brought into being changing understandings of career. Career is now understood as a concept going beyond an individual’s employment status to reach into their engagement with social, environmental and educational factors to become part of their individual experience. Alongside this transformation for individuals, the field of human resource management and organisations are being challenged to think about how best to respond to these observed changes. This review is organised into a number of sections. In the first section, various understandings of career are examined in a broad sense to identify what changes have occurred and what these may mean for both individuals and organisations. Reasons for these changes are examined alongside ideas of how ‘career’ may manifest in terms of an individual’s engagement with the concept. The second section examines the implications of these changing notions of career for individuals and for those parts of organisations with responsibility for workforce development. In the final section, the literature relating to the overall [vocational education and training] VET workforce is examined with particular emphasis on the changing nature of work in the sector, career pathways and the ways in which various practices are organised to support both individual and organisational development.

Excerpt from publication. Show less

This SCUTREA conference has as one of its themes the purposes of adult continuing education and the relationships between post-secondary sectors. This paper attempts to illuminate aspects of the relationship between the academic and vocational education sectors, drawing on empirical data from two different international contexts - Australia and Singapore. Involving international collaboration (another key theme of this conference), these two studies focused on adult 'worker-learners' (Fannon, 2004, p.1) who had moved between these two sectors. What the paper offers as its contribution to knowledge is (a) a focus on learner experiences, (b) empirical data from two different countries, (c) international collaboration and, most importantly, (d) a study of learner movement between tertiary education sectors, and in particular, of the lesser-known pathway from the academic to the vocational.

Authors' abstract. Show less