About the research

The role of vocational education and training in welfare to work - by John Guenther, Ian Falk and Allan Arnott

The Welfare to Work initiative aims to move people from income support to paid work. While the primary emphasis of this policy has been on getting people into jobs, many of those targeted need to engage in training in order to get sustainable employment; this poses a new challenge to vocational education and training (VET) providers.

The National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER) commissioned two studies to investigate the role of VET in welfare to work: one by Kate Barnett and John Spoehr called Complex not simple: The vocational education and training pathway from welfare to work, which can be found at http://www.ncver.edu.au/publications.1987.html and this report, The role of vocational education and training in welfare to work by John Guenther and colleagues. This report is based on 62 interviews with welfare clients, training providers, government agencies and enterprises, and will be of most interest to those who are directly dealing with the clients of the Welfare to Work programs.

The report focuses on what makes training programs effective for the target groups in the transition to employment and points out that there are many challenges to be faced—notably the personal circumstances of the clients and the constraints associated with contractual obligations and funding arrangements.

Key messages

Effective transitional programs must address the needs of the specific client groups. They must:

• develop employability skills
• involve considerable pastoral care from the training providers
• provide on-the-job experience and preferably a career pathway
• be flexible and allow for the personal constraints of the clients, for example, transport, childcare and illness.

Tom Karmel
Managing Director, NCVER

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