Clearing the Pathway: Improving the Transition for Students Moving Between AQF Levels 5, 6 and 7

This project examined pathways between vocational education and higher education in the built environment (building and construction) discipline. It has focussed upon the nexus between VET (TAFE) and University (HE) and student movement between AQF levels 5, 6, and 7. The construction industry has suffered critical skills gaps for the past decade, with the most chronic shortages in the professionally qualified (higher education) graduates group. The construction industry employs one in seven people in Australia and a skilled workforce in built environment is critical to national productivity. Yet, in spite of this, less than 10 per cent of the built environment workforce has higher education qualifications, compared with almost 50 per cent of the workforce with vocational education qualifications. Built environment discipline students are one of the least likely groups of all Australian students in VET (TAFE) to move onto university (HE) or to continue their formal education beyond initial training. In spite of agreed credit transfer arrangements between VET (TAFE) and university (HE), and policy recognition by tertiary institutions of the importance of pathways, the obstacles to movement between AQF levels 5, 6, and 7 appear precipitous for this discipline. This project examined tertiary pathways that accounted for successful (high retention) student transitions between VET and HE, particularly AQF levels 5, 6, &7. The project, investigated the factors or enablers that operated to support students transferring from VET (TAFE) to university (HE), (diploma to degree) in the building and construction industry, as seen through the eyes of students who had made this transition. Whilst previous research on pathways has considered the question of enablers from policy and institutional perspectives, the poor movement by built environment students warranted deeper analysis to provide lessons for those involved in learning and teaching in this discipline. The overall project aim was to establish critical factors (enablers) that contributed to student transitions and maximisation of student upskilling from VET (TAFE) to university (HE) in this discipline; and to disseminate such enablers to better inform industry