This presentation was made to a breakout session at the 2011 Skills Australia and Industry Skills Councils joint conference, "Putting Skills at the Heart of Economy". The paper addresses the challenge of measurement in workforce development planning and discusses the role of the various players in the labour and training…

The article focuses on how the present vocational education and training (VET) system in Australia might be modified to better accommodate possible VET futures change. It begins with the premise that VET's role is to contribute to skills acquisition through "formal" education and training. The authors propose a simple VET futures role…

This paper was presented to a meeting of the Wellington Exchange, an international group of higher education officials, in December 2008. One of the topics of the meeting was around the issue of possible skills shortages emerging as a result of demographic trends, with the ageing of the population of developed countries. The paper argues that this…

Competing explanations for youth unemployment (demography, minimum wages, education and training, economic conditions) have profoundly different implications for policy. The history of youth unemployment in Australia and the United States is explored and the causes of the problem as well as some solutions are evaluated. (LC)

The author outlines the dimensions of the crisis in the teenage labor market, and analyzes its implications for secondary, and particularly post-compulsory, schooling. After tracing the parallels between the post-war years and the present situation, he sketches the nature of the educational reforms that he sees as being necessary. (CT)

A study of the labor market for college graduates in Australia is examined and evaluated, and its implications for curriculum and administrative planning in higher education are discussed. It is concluded that such data collection should be widely undertaken in the future. (MSE)

Analysis of Australian higher education policy across recent Federal Labor governments and its effects on educational access and equity finds that, although social justice has been emphasized, it is mediated by economic and administrative practices that limit equity and access. (MSE)

Critics of Australian higher education policy defend the humanities by insisting that liberal and vocational education are at opposition. In fact, the generalist graduate is traditionally and increasingly valued in the labor market. A more flexible, pragmatic approach to the relationship of the humanities and vocations is need. (MSE)

It is argued that Australia's relatively uniform and consistent academic salary structure and personnel policies should be more flexible and competitive in order to alleviate current problems of academic labor market stagnation, uneven faculty distribution, and other results of financial stringency. (MSE)

Educational and occupational training programs initiated in times of high unemployment are actually designed to maintain social control of the unemployed. Current efforts by the Australian government to educate young, unemployed school leavers wrongfully shift the blame for unemployment away from the economy and onto the work force itself.…

This paper examines the relationship between Australian women's participation in paid work in the public market and the child-rearing component of their unpaid, non-market work, and the role of public policy in regulating the relationship. The study presents a historical overview of the period between 1939 and 1950. Critical concepts and the ideas…

This series of 13 articles discusses library education in Australasia. Topics covered include masters programs in Australia; library education in New Zealand and Papua New Guinea; education for technicians, teacher librarians, and rural librarians; cataloging courses; special collections librarianship; information management; the information…

This bulletin examines the labor market experience of youth in the United States and eight other industrial countries from the early 1960s to the late 1970s. The analysis focuses upon unemployment, the most visible and measurable form of labor underutilization. The report highlights the size of the youth unemployment problem and discusses some of…

This report covers a study of barriers for older workers in obtaining and benefitting from training and innovative policies to remove them. After an introduction, Chapter 2 reviews literature on incidence and determinants of older workers' participation in training; barriers to training; and employer and government initiatives to enhance older…

The problems facing young people in Australia's current labor market and the effectiveness of Australia's educational system in preparing young people for the labor market were examined. Particular attention was paid to the following issues: the reshaping of work in the modern labor market; skill development in the modern labor market; the impact…