TAFE Victoria is having some challenges ahead…

Recently in the state of Victoria the Vocational Education and Training sector, specifically the TAFEs are facing new realities with huge budget cuts  handed out left right and centre. How does this affect the local student?

With the funding that TAFEs receive from State and/or Federal government helps towards providing a more affordable training platform for students to gain practical skill sets for gaining employment. Therefore in a nutshell, less funding means programs will go up in fee price or programs get axed, staff loses jobs, unemployment increases! FACT!

Some examples emerging online like this from the University of Ballarat (found on the ABC online website):

“The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) says the University of Ballarat has slashed 40 TAFE courses as a result of Victorian Government funding cuts.

The university will stop teaching the courses and will streamline the TAFE to address the loss of $20 million in State Government funding.”

or “A Latrobe Valley community action group has been formed to fight against state government cuts to TAFE 

About 200 people attended a community forum on the impact of TAFE funding cuts at Latrobe City Council offices.

The group, made up of current and former TAFE employees, Gippsland Trades and Labour Council, unions and the general public will lobby the state government to reverse funding cuts to TAFE.” 

But the problem is not isolated to Victoria, other states are now facing similar actions from their State Government counterparts, like in NSW, Hunter TAFE is axing up to 30 courses in the wake of TAFE revenue cuts of $16million. In QLD the similar circumstances may not be far from the books too as Premier Campbell Newman is reviewing spending across his govenrment bodies to find savings.

So how does this fit into the federal governments focus on skilling people up for employment and with a growing mining industry how does all this fit into the overall picture? Well we are still piecing it all together.

But for the future until…..it looks like TAFEs are doing it tough, maybe it is time the Federal Government steps up the funding and focus on where they need to evaluate the real needs for training. Today TAFEs and Unis work closer if not are dual sector players focusing on articulations, pathways and recognition of prior learning (RPL) to help assist people gain qualifications and practical work experience in the shortest and reasonable priced time frame making them more employable (this is the key of today)

How do we contribute to a solution? Well basically we dont have all the answers, within Studyfinder we have worked on methodologies to try and establish a way that students can obtain information on courses and compare prices, funding options and also the ability to seek RPL. One thing we are looking at is developing a way to create a pathway guide for all programs on our platform. Hopefully our tool can help students find their future. We are a small step but we aim to be the first most important step in your educational direction.

Anyway enough blogging we have work to do!