Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Workplace Relations

Inquiry into the Role of Institutes of TAFE
Submissions

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Submission 15

Canberra Institute of Technology

A submission to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Training

in connection with its review of THE APPROPRIATE ROLES OF INSTITUTES OF TECHNICAL AND FURTHER EDUCATION

October 1997

 

GENERAL PROPOSITION

1 There are essential differences between the TAFE and university sectors and these distinctions should be maintained.

• It follows that these defining characteristics also need to be recognised in the way TAFE is managed at national, State, regional and institutional levels, and in the way it is funded.
• The preservation of sectoral differences should be a positive force and not be permitted to impede the appropriate development of education programs in either sector.
• Pathways for students between the sectors should be improved in both directions

DISTINCTIONS TO BE PRESERVED AND RECOGNISED IN FUNDING AND MANAGEMENT ARRANGEMENTS

2 ANTA's submission to the West Review ¹, Section 2, contains a good comparative summary of the characteristics of the VET and higher education sectors. While the two sectors have a lot in common, there are some important distinguishing characteristics that need to be preserved and recognised in the way TAFE is managed and funded. Among these are that:

• governments have more specific and explicit vocational and economic objectives for the VET sector
• industry bodies have a direct input and influence over VET policy, priority setting, course content and resource allocation
• endorsed skill standards and competency-based training are features unique to VET
• industrial relations considerations shape training in the area of regulated training.

3 The ANTA submission also outlines essential differences between the two sectors in terms of their student populations and education programs.

 PATHWAYS

The volume of traffic

4 According to ANTA the volume of students moving across the TAFE-University sectoral boundary is significant and increasing:

In 1995, the proportion of VET students holding Higher Education qualifications was 4.1% (3.6% in 1994) and of Higher Education students, 3.3% (2.7% in 1994) held VET qualifications. ²

5 This represents some 60,000 or more a year who actually make the transition and an unknown number who fail to meet admission requirements or who are dissatisfied with credit transfer arrangements.

6 Moving with credit between institutions has been a perennial problem, initially impacting on TAFE students but now involving larger numbers of university students who have difficulty in securing credit for previous study.

Options

7 There are two basic, distinctly different, options to improve pathways: mergers to form multi-sector institutions; and improved articulation arrangements between existing institutions.

8 Mergers between TAFE institutes and universities can take many forms. The best examples are to be found in Victoria. Three cases in point are RMIT, VUT and Swinburne.

9 Each of these universities has absorbed a former TAFE institution. In the case of RMIT, TAFE has, to a large extent, been fully integrated into the faculty structure of the university. In the other two universities, TAFE remains an identifiable component of a multi-sector operation.

10 All three have been examined recently in the context of a review commissioned by the Victorian Minister of arrangements for the provision of TAFE in the Melbourne metropolitan area. The Committee observed that The examples of Monash and Deakin Universities demonstrate that an internal TAFE component is not necessary in order to make a major contribution to the mobility of TAFE students. .......Monash (21.8%) and Deakin (195%) enrolled over two-fifths of all students with TAFE backgrounds commencing higher education ahead of multi-sector institutions such as RMIT(17.1%), VUT(14.1%) and Swinbume(10.4%).

The Committee concluded that

• Alliances [as distinct from merger] enable the integrity of each institution to meet the needs of specific client groups; and
• Alliances provide an incentive for credit transfer and articulation because of the functional (rather than structural) nature of alliance. ³

11 The efficiency and effectiveness of very large multi-level institutions is yet to be demonstrated. The one thing that can be said with certainty is that they are anti-competitive and therefore out of step with national competition policy initiatives, particularly in relation to VET.

12 It is also the case that placing TAFE operations inside an autonomous higher education institution fails to recognise the need to preserve different management and funding arrangements as the means to preserve essential differences based on government objectives, industry input, educational philosophy and industrial relations realities (see para 2 above).

13 In contrast to the merger option, there is evidence that alliances involving credit transfer arrangements between institutions negotiated on a bilateral basis produce good outcomes. They can be flexible and they allow each institution to continue to serve its major constituency. Above all, their continuance is based on consistent delivery of benefits to both parties. By their nature alliances can be broken and new alliances formed without confronting the costs and the difficulties of putting asunder a multi-level institution to re-form its constituent parts.

14 It is also significant that alliances do not confront the need to recognise the special role of governments and industry in setting policy and priorities for TAFE.

DUPLICATION AND OVERLAP

15 While preserving sectoral boundaries and the distinctive features of universities and TAFE makes sense for the reasons outlined above, the separation should not be thought of as absolute and a general policy of separation should not be applied unintelligently. Ideally, management and funding arrangements should be facilitating and not inhibiting, particularly in relation to education programs.

16 The primary role of TAFE institutes is to offer vocationally-oriented programs at the sub-degree level. Widespread attempts to compete with universities at degree level and above would be a waste of scarce resources and a complete distraction for TAFE.

17 None the less, there are compelling arguments for supporting the introduction of degree programs and graduate certificates and diplomas in selected course areas where TAFE institutes have special expertise and resources and where industry has a need for graduates with a practically orientation. In these circumstances it will be sensible to adopt an holistic approach to meeting industry requirements by developing, within particular TAFE institutes, a full suite of course offerings extending beyond certificate and higher level programs to include degree courses and graduate programs.

18 The AVCC holds similar views for improving the educational opportunities for all students as expressed in its submission to the West Review:

..... AVCC takes the view that, if facilities, teachers and resources are available, it is hard to see why any sector could not offer programs which are the traditional territory of another sector. The programs, however, are likely to be offered in a way which is distinctive to the particular sector and should be distinguished as such, that is, sensitive to the particular skill requirements of industry in TAFE and embracing the wider cultural context and reflective approach in universities.

19 There is no case for resourcing TAFE institutes to acquire a general research capacity. There is therefore no case for TAFE institutes to provide education programs with a research component beyond degree level. TAFE degree and graduate programs would have an essential vocational focus and practical orientation along the lines of the programs offered by the former colleges of advanced education, particularly the major institutes of technology.

20 In summary, duplication will usually be wasteful and is therefore not to be encouraged. On the other hand, where there are industry needs for practically oriented degree and graduate programs, and where such needs can be met cost-effectively by TAFE institutes, a general policy of preserving sectoral differences should not be allowed to impede a sensible response to meeting those needs.

[¹Submission to the Review of Higher Education Financing and Policy, ANTA (undated)]

[² Op Cit - P. 19]

^[3 Ministerial review on the provision of Technical and Further Education in the Melbourne metropolitan area: Options paper, August 1997 - p.26]

[⁴ Shaping Australia's Future - "Investing in Higher Education" The Australian Vice, Chancellors' Committee Submission to the Review of Higher Education Financing and Policy, April 1997, p 17]

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