The main objective of this study is to identify and discuss the motivational factors that significantly influence learners' academic success in an Australian enabling education setting. The logistic regression technique has been employed to identify the motivational factors using data collected through online surveys with 331 learners enrolled in…

The OECD Career Readiness project makes use of quantitative evidence to investigate how teenage career-related activities and attitudes are associated with better adult employment outcomes. Review of multiple national longitudinal datasets confirms 11 indicators of better outcomes linked to the ways in which teenagers explore, experience and think…

The combination of work and study has been hailed as crucial to ensure that youth develop the skills required on the labour market so that transitions from school to work are shorter and smoother. This paper fills an important gap in availability of internationally-comparable data. Using the 2012 Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), it draws a…

The Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) are a series of nationally representative surveys of young people, which follow their transitions from compulsory schooling to postschool education and into employment. The survey program is administered by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER) on behalf of the Australian…

Most existing research indicates that working students perform more poorly than do full-time students on standardized achievement tests. However, we know there are wide international variations in this gap. This article shows that national and international contexts help to explain the gap in the academic performance between working and nonworking…

It is well documented that the first-year experience is crucial to student success at university. The transition to university provides many challenges for students from a personal, social and academic perspective. Over several decades, universities across Australia have implemented strategies to improve the attrition rate of first year students.…

This paper reports on a project that investigated the first year, online experiences of vocational education and training (VET) pathway students studying at university. It was found that, although some students embraced online learning, more than twenty percent of new VET students suffered from high levels of anxiety and frustration when learning…

Combining school study with part-time or casual work is an increasing trend for Australian high school students. For some, it is a way of earning some extra cash and having a bit of freedom from their parents, or it is an opportunity to get some experience in an occupation they are interested in. This paper looks at the impact that working while…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of participation in workplace learning among senior secondary students in Australia. Work placements are deemed to be effective if they meet policy objectives of improving student transitions by (a) enhancing Year 12 completion rates and (b) increasing the engagement of…

In this report the authors seek to answer the question of whether combining school and work is detrimental or beneficial to a student's school educational performance and labour market outcomes. They find that young people who combine school and work are distributed right across the school population. Results show that individuals can combine…

While increasing numbers of young high school students engage in part-time work, there is no consensus about its impact on educational outcomes. Indeed, this field has had a dearth of research. This paper presents a review of recent research, primarily from Australia and the United States, although it is acknowledged that there are considerable…

The findings of a large national project on the part-time working careers of full-time students aged 15 to 24 challenge some widely held perceptions of large corporations that employ school students. (Contains 2 tables and 2 notes.)

What it means to be a "student" varies within and between countries. Apart from the wide variety of school types and school quality that is experienced by young people, there also is, accompanying increased rates of school participation, a growing population of students who work part-time. The theoretical and actual consequences of…

Participation in senior secondary education in Australia has experienced tremendous growth since the late 1960s. Much of this growth has come from young people who were the first in their families to participate in schooling at this level. Many of the changes in participation and in curriculum offerings have been documented as part of a number of…