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The vocational experiences and skills of young adolescents could be infused into formal education by identifying career competencies to be taught within the academic curriculum. Such curriculum practices that embed educational and career pathways must also include the perspectives of students and the community, particularly those from marginalised groups. Drawing on data from 111 teachers, principals, carers and students, this paper presents research undertaken to co-design career education lesson plans within an infused model of the curriculum for early Middle Year students from regional, rural, and remote Australia. The lesson plans and activities were designed to allow for meaningful self-reflection and goal-setting that could be seamlessly infused into the formal curriculum and help embed early-stage career education. The paper concludes by projecting opportunities and challenges for seamless curriculum integration, while pertinent to the Australian context, can also be read with broader relevance to other educational systems and schools.

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In this report it is argued that in a third of local authorities that make up the eight city regions in the UK, no major employment sites (defined by having 5,000 or more jobs) are within a 20 minute commute by public transport and 80 per cent of these local authorities have an unemployment rate above the national average. The report suggests that making it easier for people, especially those on low incomes, to commute a further 20 minutes each way would put them within touch of two or more major employment sites, and potentially 10,000 more jobs. An extra 20 minutes would double the average commute but the attraction of better jobs and higher wages would be a reason to travel further.

The report puts forward a number of proposals for improving access to major cities. These include: offering tax benefits to commuters who use ride-sharing schemes and free parking in city centres for car sharing; the introduction of part-time rail tickets to reduce the fares for commuters who travel to work three or four days a week; the devolution of rail franchises to local transport bodies in city regions to encourage the spread of smart ticketing, and transferring responsibility for London's suburban commuter services to Transport for London; and devolving the commercial bus subsidy to local government to improve routes and bring down fares. The research also shows that smaller isolated cities and coastal towns cannot access any major employment centre within either a 20 or 40 minute public transport journey. These places struggle with persistently high unemployment and are effectively cut off from opportunities elsewhere. The report proposes that personalised welfare budgets and relocation packages to incentivise the best teachers to work in their schools can help people who live in these areas access jobs further afield.

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This paper considers the role of learning communities in promoting lifelong learning futures in 'seachange' locations, where the movement of people into regional coastal towns has created both tensions and opportunities. I focus on the seachange experience of the Capricorn Coast, exploring how learning communities might respond to climate change.

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The national strategy for regional competitiveness, entrepreneurship and employment 2007-2013 should help to create competitive regions and individuals in Sweden. The government has identified the following national priorities for regional competitiveness, entrepreneurship and employment 2007-2013: innovation and renewal; skills supply and improved workforce supply; accessibility; and strategic cross-border cooperation. In accordance with the European strategic guidelines for cohesion, the national strategy provides guidelines for structural fund programmes for regional competitiveness and employment 2007-2013. The strategy forms Sweden’s national strategic reference framework for cohesion policy, which is to be implemented in Sweden via eight regional structural fund programmes and a national structural fund programme with eight regional plans.

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This study sought to examine the factors that influence the uptake and effectiveness of online learning in regional Australia, looking in particular at the benefits and barriers this mode offers either 'stand alone' or as part of a structured program of delivery. Our methodology focused on interviewing and discussing aspects of planning, delivering and experiencing online learning with managers, educational developers, teachers and students, in order to investigate some of the organisational aims and understandings, and contrast and compare them to the actual lived experience of learners and teachers. The research team wanted to test out the 'anywhere, anytime...' promises that accompany online learning; the promotion of 'learning in a time and place that suits you...' and also the organisational motivations behind providing online learning options. The target organisations provided a wide geographical VET [vocational education and training] program spread. However, their systems did not allow for separate identification and tracking of 'online' students, so it was more difficult to find learner and teacher participants than originally anticipated. Decisions by teachers to engage in online delivery appeared to be related to their motivation, preference and previous experience. The practice we identified and tracked predominantly included online with 'mixed-mode', often classroom-based activity. Managers' perspectives identified a number of online strategy and implementation issues including infrastructure difficulties inherent to effective implementation, problems with accessing and maintaining skilled staff, and the lack of coordination in the development of policy and platforms between state and national authorities.

Published abstract.

The collected proceedings are indexed at TD/TNC 74.501; the collected PowerPoint presentations are indexed at TD/TNC 74.530; available papers are indexed from TD/TNC 74.502 to TD/TNC 74.529. Show less

This paper explores lifelong learning through the provision of regional and rural education in relation to national and global trends. The paper draws on the experience of the Centre for Regional Education, Orange: this centre being a multi-sector initiative that focuses on improved access and to further and higher education, especially for regional and rural students, through an expanded range of degree programs, curriculum pathways, and resources.

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The volume from which this paper is taken is indexed in two parts at TD/TNC 80.451 and TD/TNC 80.452. Selected papers from this conference are indexed at TD/ACT 78.02 and TD/ACT 79.04; from TD/TNC 80.453 to TD/TNC 80.477 and from TD/TNC 80.614 to TD/TNC 80.617. Show less

This paper examines whether firms are less likely to provide apprenticeship training in dense local labour markets, where the probability that workers can be poached by other firms after training is high. Defining regional labour markets based on travel time rather than travel distance or political borders, the results show that firms provide less training in dense labour markets. Applying count data hurdle models to Swiss firm-level data, it can be shown that the effect is strongest at the extensive margin, which is to provide any training, but less severe at the intensive margin, which is the number of apprenticeship positions offered once the training decision has been made.

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There has been a stark decline in the size and diversity of the Year 12 Economics student population since the early 1990s. The Reserve Bank has commissioned a comprehensive survey of students to gain quantitative evidence of the factors contributing to this decline. The survey responses highlight that while economics in general is perceived to be important for society, many students lack an interest in, or understanding of, Economics as a subject. This finding is even more pronounced for students who are female, those from a lower socio-economic background and those from regional schools.

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The Australian economy continues to undergo significant structural change. Since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), one of the features of this adjustment has been the accelerated decline of the manufacturing sector. In the five years to December 2013, manufacturing employment in Australia declined by 9.6 per cent, or 99,000 jobs. [The authors] investigate how Australia adapted to the considerable decline in manufacturing employment in recent years. The paper builds on previous research that has attempted to quantify the relationship between structural change and unemployment. Specifically, [the authors] examine the role that changes in manufacturing employment have played in employment-to-working-age-population ratios and unemployment rates at the Statistical Area Level 4 (SA4) between 2006 and 2011 using data from the Australian Census of Population and Housing. [The authors] find that the recent accelerated decline of the manufacturing sector did have a statistically significant impact on employment and unemployment rates at the SA4 level, but that Australia has shown resilience in the face of structural change and has demonstrated considerable capacity to adjust. Changes in skill levels more than offset the negative impacts of the decline in manufacturing on employment and unemployment rates.

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This thesis examines recent Australian and Canadian policies aimed at the dispersal of skilled and business immigrants away from large cities. This thesis fulfills the need to analyse Australian and Canadian regional migration policies that have been pursued for around a decade and are currently undergoing a rapid development, but have not yet been studied extensively. This thesis commences with a comparative analysis of the policies' nature and practice. Although the policies are motivated by similar population and socioeconomic trends, and therefore have similar objectives, this thesis shows that the Australian and Canadian responses to common challenges differ partially. The analysis concentrates on how the Australian state/territory and the Canadian provincial/territorial governments address their policies' objectives.

The thesis elucidates the factors that underpin these different approaches, such as the divergent constitutional responsibilities in the matter of immigration, and Australian and Canadian policy understanding of concepts of 'region' and 'skills'. These constitutional and conceptual differences also condition the Australian state/territory and the Canadian provincial/territorial governments' degree of control over the design and implementation of the policies. The analysis reveals how sometimes divergent policy solution, so conditioned, are employed to address similar policy objectives. The position taken by this thesis is that the governments use innovative responses and are highly active in that policy sphere. The differences notwithstanding, it is concluded that the design of these policies seems potentially capable of addressing the population and economic objectives.

An evaluation of the actual policies' outcomes shows however that they have not yet become successful on any considerable scale, with few exceptions evident in both countries. This results from low absolute numbers of regional migrants when distributed among the participating jurisdiction, and a persistent preference for settlement in large cities. In Australia, the latter sometimes contravenes the stated policy intentions. This thesis closes with suggestions on cross-country policy exchanges that could improve policy outcomes and discusses additional solution, especially relevant in the Australian context, that might be considered as policy results-enhancing measures.

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