Shifting mindsets: The changing work roles of vocational education and training practitioners

• Three major external drivers of change have impacted on the daily working lives of vocational education and training (VET) practitioners over the past three years. These are government policy, the expectations of industry and the community, and funding and financing.

• The greatest changes in the working lives of practitioners have been in the areas of work responsibilities, relationships with industry and relationships with colleagues.

• The introduction of training packages, increased competition among training providers and changes to funding have had the greatest impact on practitioners' work. These are followed by technology, competency-based training and flexible delivery.

• Practitioners are generally positive about the changes. Private providers are most positive and are more focused on external matters, such as funding, understanding changes to vocational education and training, and meeting industry needs. Those in public providers are more focused on matters concerning teaching-learning practice, such as flexible delivery, training packages and the effects these have on their roles and work. They are more negative than those in private providers in their attitudes to change.

Vocational education and training (VET) practitioners have been subject to unparalleled change in the past ten years. Building on previous work (Harris et al. 2001), this project set out to explore how the changing environment is impacting on practitioners' work and the implications these changes have for the quality of VET provision and the role of the new VET professionals.

Three main research approaches were employed-a literature review, ten focus group discussions in five states in both capital cities and regional areas, and individual interviews. A total of 64 interviews were undertaken (with respondents different from those in the focus groups). Since group discussion only generates contextual information and provides the general picture of VET change, there needed also to be information from individuals to 'ground' the personal impact of such change.

The sources of information were VET practitioners who included teachers and trainers, industry mentors, training brokers, assessors, providers of learning support and managers. These practitioners were working in a wide range of registered training organisations, public and private, large and small.

Practitioners perceived that drivers for change were largely attributable to influences outside their place of employment. They named government policy as having the most marked effect, influencing curriculum practices and the way training is provided. The second major driver was the expectations of industry and the community, and the third was economics/finances. These three factors were judged to be closely interrelated and to drive each other, with policy being the prime driver of change affecting VET practitioners, especially at this time of transition to training packages. Internal drivers included increased expectations for responsiveness, pressure for greater accountability, rethinking approaches to teaching and learning and access to learning opportunities, changing workloads, and student characteristics.

These identified drivers of change have led to many shifts in various aspects of the working life of VET practitioners and their relationships both within and outside VET organisations. By far the greatest change reported was in their work responsibilities, with 86% claiming that this aspect of their working life had changed 'a lot' or 'to some extent' (63% saying 'a lot'). The second most important change for VET practitioners related to their relationships with industry (71%). This is not an unexpected result, and is in keeping with policy directions which have emphasised as a key outcome a greater relationship and involvement with industry in the provision of vocational education and training. Changing relationships with colleagues (64%), students/trainees (61%), and other registered training organisations (59%) are represented as significant, but less felt areas of change.

Analysis of personal reactions to these changes found that:

• VET staff in public training providers (97%) noted significantly greater change in work responsibilities than did those in private providers (71%).

• VET staff in private training providers (67%) noted significantly greater change in relationships with students and trainees than did those in public providers (54%).

• Training packages, followed by competition and changes to funding, have had the greatest impact on practitioners' work over the past five years. These were followed by technology, competency-based training and flexible delivery.

• Technology, and then competition and flexible delivery, are anticipated to have the greatest impact on practitioners' work over the next five years, followed by training packages, changes to funding, and understanding changes to VET.

• Staff from private providers are more focused on the external environment (for example, funding, understanding changes to VET and meeting industry needs), while staff from public providers are more focused on teaching-learning practice (for example, flexible delivery, training packages and their effects on the roles and work of teachers and trainers).

• Staff in managing roles were more focused on funding changes and developing partnerships and opportunities to increase their business than were teachers and trainers who, in turn, were more focused on their changing roles and work, and organisational restructuring.

• VET practitioners were more positive than negative about changes they had experienced in their work context, with 61% of practitioners judged to be positive and 24% negative (with 15% neutral).

• Practitioners in private providers (75%) were significantly more positive towards these changes to work than their counterparts in public providers (48%). In fact, all those reporting a negative feeling (n=13) were from public providers.

• A majority of practitioners gauged that they had had reasonable control over changes to their work over the past five years: 11% reported no control, 24% minimal control, 3% some control, 56% major control and 6% complete control.

• Those in a managing role (74%) reported a greater sense of control over the changes they had experienced, which was significantly more than teachers and trainers (48%).

• Compared with key VET stakeholders' views from a study undertaken two years earlier, VET practitioners have similar perspectives. Both highly rank competition and keeping up with changes as major challenges, although practitioners noticeably place more importance on understanding their changing educational work, work in general and their role.

The scope and nature of the reforms that VET practitioners have been asked to implement are not simply a matter of substituting one set of teaching and learning practices for others. Changes to the VET system have required shifts in practitioners' habits, beliefs, values, skills and knowledge. The findings illustrate the important position that VET practitioners occupy in the policy-making and implementation processes in the sector. It would appear from this study that practitioners are attempting to alert policy-makers and managers to their perceptions of the very real issues and concerns being confronted in their daily working lives.

The study concludes with a discussion of the changing context of VET practitioners' work and of the VET workforce itself, and an exploration of the notions of role expansion, role diversification, role balance and role tension, all concepts relevant to today's VET practitioners. The key theme is the differing impact of the various drivers for change on VET organisations and individual VET practitioners. The report indicates that policy frameworks and implementation strategies need to be sensitive to the nature and scope of change required for the different contexts in which vocational education and training now operates. The size and complexity of the VET sector demands a rethinking of a 'one size fits all' approach to policy implementation.

This study may act as a trigger for policy-makers to reassess the role of VET practitioners in the policy-making process and to give consideration to practitioners becoming more active and empowered participants in the change process, rather than passive and sometimes resistant recipients of change.