The non-apprenticeship VET sector provides a successful pathway from school to further education and training for young Australians from all socioeconomic backgrounds, according to Julie McMillan, Sheldon Rothman and Nicole Wernert. They find that around 20 per cent of young Australians had enrolled in a non-apprenticeship VET course by age 19. By age 20 in...

The development of a uniquely Australian system of innovation and its relation to the vocational education and training (VET) system is considered in this discussion paper. Richard Pickersgill argues that the Australian system of innovation fits the pattern of incremental innovation and diffusion of technical knowledge. He focuses on arrangements prior to the formation of...

Increasingly, vocational education and training practitioners work with industry and within private enterprises in arrangements that provide training for workers. Drawing on interviews with TAFE practitioners and managers, enterprise managers and on-the-job learners, Roger Harris, Michele Simons and Julian Moore highlight the expanding roles of TAFE practitioners in these training arrangements. They find that in...

This mixed methods study investigated the relationship between young people's vocational aspirations and their adult occupations using three datasets collected at different times across a twenty year time span. Data from two studies of the same cohort of 858 longitudinal study participants (as teens, in 1986/7 and at age 32, in 2004/5) were used to...

Key messages A systematic review of research is a decision-making tool for policy and practice. It is a piece of research in its own right, using explicit and rigorous methods that follow a standard set of stages. These methods identify, critically appraise and synthesise relevant research (both published and unpublished) around a specific research question...