Existing research on vocational education and training (VET) for entry-level employment in Australia was reviewed. According to the review, research on entry-level VET has enhanced knowledge related to the following: competence requiring knowledge and understanding as well as performance; graded standards-based assessment; problems of policy implementation; and unforeseen consequences or practical limitations of existing policies. The following areas were identified as requiring strategic policy-relevant research: reasons for the decline in apparent retention to year 12 since 1993; reasons for the decline in provision of apprenticeship opportunities and in the educational profile of students enrolling in apprenticeship programs; relationship between employers' and trainees' participation in work-based training arrangements and incentives (including training wages and subsidies); learning processes associated with achieving competence; further work on graded standards-based assessment; and factors affecting transfer of knowledge and skill. The following types of data were deemed necessary in the interests of more soundly based policymaking: regularly collected (preferably annually) data on the employment, educational, and training activities of young people in the first 5 years out from compulsory schooling; data on private providers of entry-level training; and equity data on all groups of disadvantaged participants in entry-level training. (Contains 122 references.) (MN)