OECD Reviews of Vocational Education and Training: A Learning for Jobs Review of Australia 2008

Learning for Jobs is an OECD study of vocational education and training (VET) designed to help countries make their VET systems more responsive to labour market needs. The Australian VET system has many strengths including strong engagement of employers, a well established national qualification system, extensive VET data and research. The system is flexible and allows for a fair degree of local autonomy and experimentation. But at the same time there are a number of challenges, including a lack of clarity and potentially duplication in the respective roles of Commonwealth, states and territories in planning and delivering VET, a lack of clear and simple rules for entitlement to funding, difficulties in providing a reliable foundation in skills forecasts, some gaps in the data base, somewhat complicated and cumbersome training packages and an ageing teacher and trainer workforce. The OECD review assesses the main challenges faced by the VET system and presents an interconnected package of policy recommendations. For each recommendation, the report describes the challenge, the recommendation itself, supporting arguments, and issues of implementation.