Every year, the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER) releases extensive data and analysis into the vocational education and training (VET) sector in Australia, delivered by Australian registered training organisations (RTOs).

The ‘Total VET students and courses’ Report is released annually, and provides a detailed examination of ‘total VET activity’ of the previous year.

The data refers to students who have participated in nationally recognised VET; specifically those who have undertaken study on a government funded or fee-for-service basis.

Similar to our report on the 2018 data set, we’ve taken a look at the high level insights, and broken them down for you.

Key Takeaways:

In 2019, we saw a 4.2% increase in government funded students to 1.2 million, which reversed a downwards trend that we had seen over the previous two years.

In our review of the NCVER 2018 data set, we reflected on how the demise of the VET FEE HELP scheme could have played a role in driving down enrolments in government funded courses across the 2015-2018 period. It’s difficult, however, to draw any conclusions after just one year of positive growth, and what this will mean in the future.

Compared to last year, domestic fee-for-service students increased to their highest level (increase of 2.8% compared to 2018) since the NCVER VET data set was consolidated in 2015.

Interestingly, government funded student numbers increased across all of the Australian states in 2019 compared to 2018, but dipped slightly across the territories. With popular initiatives such as FREE TAFE in Victoria, Smart and Skilled in NSW and the Certificate III Guarantee in Queensland, we will continue to observe whether these numbers are sustained over the next couple of years.

The introduction of JobTrainer, and other post COVID-19 reform packages will also have a lasting impact on these numbers in the years to come.

According to the NCVER, there has been a 11.4% increase in students enrolling in private training providers since 2015, and an uplift of 4.3% compared to last year. In 2019, 3.0 million students, 72.1% of the overall total, were enrolled in nationally recognised training at private training providers.

In 2019, there was an increase in student numbers across every single provider type:

In 2018, the number of students enrolled in nationally recognised training programs continued its downwards trend, while subjects not delivered as part of a nationally recognised program continued to increase (54.6% increase since 2015).

In 2019, enrolments in nationally recognised programs actually reversed this trend, and increased by a total of 3.0%.

The NCVER data does note that the increase in subjects that are not part of a nationally recognised program is due to both better reporting and increase in activity. However, commentary from last year’s data has pointed to a general upwards trend in enrolments in short courses and broader skill-sets across the entire VET/Higher Education sector, such as the rise of micro-credentials.

How this trend will affect VET enrolment numbers in the future is still unknown. However, the recommendations in the recent Australian Qualifications Framework Review suggests that perhaps micro-credentials and shorter form courses might form part of the VET landscape very soon.

The most popular training packages (by enrolments) tend to remain fairly consistent YoY, unless there are significant changes in the training packages themselves.

In 2019, 84.8% of all enrolments in nationally recognised programs were in training package qualifications.

CPP40307 Certificate IV in Property Services (Real Estate) was the only qualification to drop out of the Top 20 in 2019 (down 15%) to 28th on the list.

The FNS40217 – Certificate IV in Accounting and Bookkeeping qualification came in at 19th in its first full year as combined qualification (previously, Accounting and Bookkeeping were separate qualifications).

Other notable figures include a 69% increase in enrolments for the TAE40116 – Certificate IV in Training and Assessment compared to 2018, and a 27% decrease in enrolments for BSB51918 – Diploma of Leadership and Management.

The 5 most popular training packages in 2019 were the same as 2018, and each of these training packages saw an increase in enrolments compared to 2018.

There was a significantly higher number of government funding enrolments in Community Services training packages compared to Business Services (85.7% higher) in 2019 (233,705 compared to 126,475 enrolments).

However, when looking at domestic fee for services enrolments, BSB training packages had a much higher proportion of enrolments compared to CHC training packages (21.6% higher); 127,555 enrolments to 104,606 respectively.

Overall, however, Business Services has much higher enrolment numbers as a result of the high proportion of international fee for service enrolments.

Of all the international VET fee for service enrolments in 2019, 41.7% were in BSB training packages, representing 113,225 of overall enrolments.

It will be interesting to see how these enrolment numbers develop in 12 months’ time across these two training packages, as a result of the drop in international student numbers in 2020.

In 2018, we reflected on the decline in enrolments in government funded courses as something to keep an eye on, as both industry and government looked to tackle the nation’s skills shortages.

While we’ve seen a slight increase in government funded course enrolments, the different funding arrangements across the states and territories will continue to influence student enrolment numbers and affect our ability to answer skills shortages.

Since last year, however, we’ve also seen the release of the landmark Joyce Review and the Australian government’s commitment to ‘strengthening the vocational education and training (VET) sector’ via its $585.3 million Skills Package.

With a slew of reforms including the AQF Review, ASQA Review as well as an ongoing Review into VET Student Loans, the government released a draft ‘VET Reform Roadmap’ in February this year, a five year plan that looks to address the future of VET and its continued importance.

The VET Reform Roadmap has come at a challenging time. The industry is grappling with the long lasting effects of COVID-19, universities are shifting their focus due to a sudden drop in international enrolments, together with the adjusting needs of the workforce and skills during a period of peak unemployment.

Last year, we identified the decline in enrolments across training package qualifications as something to monitor, as an increasing number of students look towards skill sets, single subjects and micro-credentials that sit outside the qualifications framework. We expect to see the evolution of this trend through the progression of this yearly data set.

While 2019 did see a slight increase in enrolments across the VET sector in national training programs, the jury is out on how the 2020 pandemic will influence the data.

What is still clear is that private training providers will and continue to play a huge role in VET enrolments, and any policy making decisions will need to take this into account. It is predicted that the $500 million JobTrainer funding package will lean on private training providers that are already delivering government funded training, as well as TAFEs.

Future funding arrangements will have a significant impact on this data set for the years to come. While slowing wage growth may have been a concern in 2018 and a motivator for students to commence studying, answering skills shortages and boosting economic productivity will be key factors in the next couple of years as we recover from the current crisis.

Continued support of VET across the private and public sector will be needed in order to sustain the economy.

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Australian Government’s Department of Education, Skills and Employment has launched a higher education reform package to create job-ready graduates by focusing on public investment in higher education based on national priorities.

The aim is to deliver more job-ready graduates in the key areas, thereby driving Australia’s economic recovery from the current downturn.

We take a look at the funding reforms discussed in the accompanying report, “Job-Ready Graduates: Higher Education Reform Package 2020”.

The Government’s reform package is designed to maintain and sustain the Australian higher education system for students and employers.

This will be done by addressing funding rates, promoting nationally-beneficial university-industry collaboration, creating a more responsive qualifications framework, and setting up the foundation for national economic growth, to name a few of the reforms.

As the coronavirus pandemic exposes vulnerabilities in Australia’s higher education sector, the nation’s ability to recover economically will depend on the number of highly-skilled, creative and dynamic workers we have in our labour market.

Therefore, Australian universities and industry need to be primed to respond to the needs of Australians in the next five years.

To meet the above objectives, the reform package centres itself around the following five principles:

The agenda for these reforms are as follows:

By making the government funding system more efficient, Australia will be able to support an additional 39,000 university places by 2023 and almost 100,000 student places by 2030.

Some of the ways this will be done include:

Education participation and attainment rates continue to be significantly lower in regional and remote Australia compared to metropolitan areas.

Some of the ways that equity can be achieved include:

Universities and industry must collaborate more closely to provide valuable and relevant skills to workers.

This will be achieved by:

Higher education reform is now more important than ever due to the ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In order to recover from the economic impact of the pandemic, Australian universities and industry need to work together to skill students appropriately in line with workforce needs.

There’s no question that the COVID-19 pandemic has affected all spheres of life, from employment and education to recreation and leisure.

One domain which has been hit hard is the vocational education sector, with apprentices and trainees being left in the lurch part way through their studies due to the coronavirus-induced downturn.

We explore the short and long-term effects of the coronavirus pandemic as discussed in the Mitchell Institute’s ‘Impact of COVID-19 on Apprentices & Trainees’ report, and unpack what the findings could mean for the nation’s workforce and economy as a whole.

As social distancing measures were rolled out to limit the amount of non-essential close contact individuals could have, thousands of Australian trainees and apprentices quickly found themselves out of work.

Less experienced workers, apprentices and trainees are often the first to be let go when times are tough. On top of this, many apprentices and trainees work in the hospitality, beauty, construction or automotive industries, all of which have been hit extremely hard by coronavirus restrictions.

While it is unclear just how many apprentices and trainees have lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic, the Mitchell Institute forecasts that traineeship and apprenticeship enrolments will decline by 20% over the next few years, hitting their lowest point in 2023.

45,000 fewer commencements are expected in 2021 and 2022 compared to pre-coronavirus levels, with this number eventually dropping to 50,000 in 2023.

As a response to these worrying predictions, the Australian Government has provided some financial support to employers and workers.

The JobKeeper payment is perhaps the most well-known, being extended to eligible employers to help them retain staff.

Treasury estimates suggest that without JobKeeper, the unemployment rate would reach 15% instead of the current forecast of 10%.

The Federal Government has also launched the Supporting Apprentices and Trainees initiative, which offers a wage subsidy to help businesses with their cash flow and retention of existing apprentices and trainees.

Around 70,000 small businesses are expected to benefit from the subsidy, being able to keep 117,000 apprentices and trainees in work and training.

However, the Mitchell Institute warns that these measures could mask the real impact of the economic downturn, as we will only see the real decline in commencements 18-24 months after the onset of the recession.

So, what are the long-term effects we can expect to see from the coronavirus crisis, and what measures are being taken to boost the Australian economy’s resilience?

According to the Mitchell Institute, previous recessions have been characterised by an amplified relationship between the unemployment rate and apprenticeship/traineeship figures.

The last two recessions saw apprenticeship commencements (the number of apprenticeship/traineeship training contracts that started in a given time frame) declining by 30% for every five percentage points that the unemployment rate rose.

What this means in real terms, is that over 100,000 people will miss out on the vocational training that they otherwise would have completed.

The reduction in the number of apprenticeships and traineeships on offer will also lead to 50% of school leavers being classed as not in employment, education or training (NEET), which indicates disengagement and points towards poor long-term outcomes.

While stimulus packages and policies are assisting in the short term, the Mitchell Institute warns that these measures may actually mask the extent of the downturn.

On top of this, how many host employers will actually be able to retain their apprentices and trainees after the JobKeeper payments subside in September?

We are likely to see long-lasting ripples from this reduction in apprentice and trainee numbers, such as skills shortages and a slow economic recovery.

With apprentices and trainees being necessary for the economy to recover, but there being fewer opportunities for these young people due to the pandemic, we risk being stuck in a vicious cycle if the right measures aren’t taken now.

A number of policy responses are suggested by stakeholders, including:

With skills shortages already being pronounced prior to the pandemic, Australia simply can’t afford to let apprentices and trainees fall by the wayside.

Planning needs to be carried out to help apprentices and trainees stay employed, while also offering opportunities to new apprentices and trainees entering the workforce.

The Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) has recently released its annual report on TEQSA registered Higher Education providers.

The organisation is Australia’s independent national quality assurance and regulatory agency for higher education, with the report providing an insight into the current state of the higher education sector in Australia.

Key Takeaways:

The report points to the size and diversity of the Australian Higher Education sector, with 172 registered providers enrolling 1,537,081 students for all or part of 2017.

There has also been a moderate increase in student participation, with there being a 4% rise in the number of students between 2016 and 2017:

The number of international students is of particular note, with there being a 10% increase in the international student population from 2016 to 2017.

As of 2018, China remains the main international source market for universities and not-for-profit provider categories, while India is the main source market for the for-profit provider category.

The Higher Education courses of study with the highest growth were Health and Education, rising by 4% each from 2016 to 2017. This points towards a greater awareness among students of the skills gaps set to emerge as Australia’s education and healthcare needs continue to grow.

Overall student numbers are still highest in the Management and Commerce fields of study, which have both the highest number of undergraduate and post-graduate students.

69% of Australia’s student population are domestic students, while 31% are international students. 75% of students are undertaking an undergraduate degree, while 25% are pursuing postgraduate qualifications.

92.2% of TEQSA providers are universities, while 5.2% are for-profit institutions, 2.1% are not-for-profit institutions, and 0.5% are TAFEs. 42% of providers are registered in NSW, while 26% are in Victoria.

11 non-university providers had partial or full self-accrediting authority in 2017 (including one for-profit provider that was granted partial self-accrediting authority), hinting at the growing legitimacy of non-university education pathways.

New course accreditation has dropped compared to previous years, decreasing in every broad field of education (BFoE) and all of the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) levels except AQF level 7. The decline can be attributed to the introduction of the new standards, which came into effect on 1 January 2017.

Management and Commerce BFoE continue to have the largest number of course accreditations, followed by the Society and Culture BFoE (together accounting for 60% of new course accreditations in 2017).

Australia’s student body continues to increase alongside its population, and as Australian educational institutions continue to draw the attention of international students. With the rise of education services for overseas students, these numbers can be expected to grow.

The popularity of Management and Commerce may be explained by the fields’ global relevance and appeal in the eyes of international students.

While universities still have the highest proportion of students, there has also been a gradual increase in student enrolments at other provider types, such as for-profit, not-for-profit and TAFE, for the past four years. The overseas sector experienced the largest growth out of all provider types, with not-for-profit providers seeing a 23% increase in overseas students from 2015.

A flexible student experience also seems to be a top priority for today’s learner, with there being a 39% increase in the number of commencing students attending via a flexible delivery mode since 2015. At the same time, however, the number of commencing students attending via a flexible delivery mode at TAFE and not-for-profit institutions declined by 30% and 19% respectively in 2016.

The Australian Higher Education sector continues to grow, drawing in more international students than ever. Provider categories are also diversifying further, catering to more types of students than ever before.

A landmark review into the Australian Qualifications Review (AQF) has just been released, with many saying it could fuel the biggest shake-up in the Australian tertiary sector in many years.

The Review, led by Professor Peter Noonan of Victoria University, hopes to dismantle the ‘rigid’ structure of the current AQF, leading the way towards more flexible learning, and paving the path towards recognition of ‘micro-credentials’.

The AQF sets out the national policy for regulated educational qualifications in Australia, ranging from Certificate I to Doctoral Degrees. It has not been revised in seven years and was created in 1993.

Under pressure to answer current skills shortages and adapt to the needs of the modern economy, the Government will hopefully use the Review’s recommendations as a way to redefine learning outcomes and address the changing nature of work.

The Review gives weight on the idea of ‘lifelong learning’, and how shorter qualifications can and must form a part of education and training, particularly in emerging sectors.

The Review doesn’t explicitly state that micro-credentials should fall within the AQF framework but makes a case for short courses as being fundamental to filling the skills gap and widening support for them.

The Review also focuses on the need for better pathways between different education and training sectors and hopes to address some of the current perceptions surrounding the VET sector in Australia.

Recommendations include simplification in the AQF taxonomy and better flexibility in the pathways for students between the Vocational and Higher Education Systems.

With an ability to mix and match credits between VET and Higher Education, the Review hopes that this will lead to better job outcomes for students.

The AQF Review is one of many initiatives the Government is working on at the moment to try and revitalise the tertiary sector.

Of particular focus is VET, with Senator Michaelia Cash very keen on:

This comes after the release of the Joyce Review into vocational education earlier this year.

There is also a planned review of the Australian Skills Quality Authority, as well as the newly formed National Skills Commission, which is intended to ‘drive long-term improvements to the VET sector’.

It’s still unclear what direction and decisions the government will take with their renewed focus on the tertiary sector, but it seems as if a change is on the horizon.