Enhancing the retention of young people to Year 12, especially through vocational skills

When the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) met in Hobart on 30th April 2009, it proposed a range of education and training initiatives designed to address rising\ud unemployment – an outcome of the economic downturn. The Compact with Young Australians announced at that time is intended to provide Australia’s youth with access to\ud education and training places. The Compact, through its National Youth Participation Requirement, makes participation in education, training or employment compulsory for all young people until they reach the age of 17 years. In addition it sets a target of 90 per cent Year 12 or equivalent attainment for the next decade. Retention to Year 12 and successful transition to work or further study for young Australians has become, therefore, a key policy for all Australian governments. The challenge for schools and TAFE institutes is to develop and sustain vocational programs and retention/ transition strategies that engage, support, encourage and excite young people sufficiently to build the skills they require to complete\ud Year 12 or its equivalent and move on to work or further study. This paper reports on the early stages of a research project being undertaken for TAFE Directors Australia and the Australian College of Educators. Funded by the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, the project is seeking to develop case studies of innovative programs in youth retention and transition conducted by secondary schools operating independently and/ or in partnership with TAFE Institutes and vocational\ud colleges based in TAFE Institutes. These case studies will be benchmarked against an evaluative framework developed using criteria drawn from research on youth retention and\ud transition in Australia and internationally