No matter how you think about it, both nursery rhymes are a palpable reflection of an evolving story in Australia’s Vocational Education and Training (“VET”) sector in the past week.
What do you mean, you ask?
This article discusses students who have died while participating in VET courses or have been seriously injured as a result of their participation in VET courses. This article includes links and photographs to media reports of their deaths and injuries and discusses deceased people.
On 13 July 2022, the ABC reported that Chisholm TAFE, through its online delivery platform ‘Chisholm Online’ in Victoria (Australia), left students without any course materials, including lessons, assessments, and trainers and assessors for the mental health courses at least were in absentia. Several health and community services courses on offer under the banner of ‘FREE TAFE courses online’ have been without these resources for over six months according to the article, and student complaints and some assessment questions (for those that are available) don’t even make sense. What courses are affected, you might ask? Courses include, but are not limited to:
Putting aside the fact that some of these courses are explicitly listed as ‘VET Courses of Concern’ in ASQA’s Regulatory Strategy 2020-2022, they are also courses where the community is in danger if they are not delivered and assessed in a compliant manner.
By way of example, in CHC43315 - Certificate IV in Mental Health, some of the core units require students to be able to provide services to people with co-existing mental health and alcohol and other drugs issues, work effectively in trauma-informed care and either (or both) recognise and respond to crisis situations or increase the safety of individuals at risk of suicide. The ABC article includes the following:
“...since January, Chisholm Online has failed to provide her with lessons, assessments and, in some cases, even teachers”.
“Students the ABC has spoken to say the meagre coursework that has been available has been woefully inadequate – giving them little expertise to help people in their darkest hours’.
“I've been offered three jobs, and I was unable to accept them because I don't feel competent to work in the industry, because I don't have the foundation skills that Chisholm online were meant to provide to me”.
According to the article, Chisholm advised students in February this year that course delays were ‘...because it had to urgently overhaul the course so it was compliant with industry standards’.
This LinkedIn article is not being written to say ‘how bad TAFE is’ or how good or bad private providers are. It is about four things only:
Identifying and articulating the issues and ensuring that they are on the public record, understood and hopefully some level of accountability is executed;
Before we go there, though, what is the correlation between this article and Humpty Dumpty and London Bridge?
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall,
All the King’s Horses and all the King’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again.
Sometimes when I think of ASQA and its journey as a regulator since its establishment, I feel like we really could be singing this nursery rhyme. ASQA did have a great fall, in fact, it had several great falls. All the Kings horses and all the Kings men (could be compared to the various reviews it has been involved in) and because we are still seeing these issues demonstrating that despite it all, ASQA may not still be fit for purpose, means that despite those reviews, Humpty (ASQA) cannot be put back together again.
London Bridge is falling down,
Falling down, falling down.
London Bridge is falling down,
My fair lady.
Set a man to watch all night,
Watch all night, watch all night,
Set a man to watch all night,
My fair lady.
Suppose the man should fall asleep,
Fall asleep, fall asleep,
Suppose the man should fall asleep?
My fair lady.
While it would be easy to align London Bridge to a similar meaning as Humpty Dumpty, historically, it is said that the London Bridge nursery rhyme has a far more sinister meaning; that unless a human sacrifice were made, the bridge would collapse.
I have very intentionally selected this nursery rhyme to demonstrate that despite human sacrifices being made by several TAFEs around the country, they are still standing and London Bridge did not fall down! Before anyone calls me out for blasphemy, let me demonstrate some of these incidents in the public interest (thanks to the Twitter account of ‘Education Issues Australia’).
Aviation industry
On 12 December 2019, The Age newspaper reported that after receiving complaints from students, ASQA began an audit into aviation courses run in partnership between Box Hill TAFE and Soar Aviation and suspended those aviation courses for a week. Less than a month later, a trainee pilot was left with life-long injuries after a plane crash at Moorabbin Airport. As The Age reports, Soar Aviation had been involved in a ‘training flight crash’ a year earlier near Stawell, seriously injuring the student and the pilot.
The Australian Transport and Safety Bureau is also investigating another incident involving Soar Aviation, where an instructor and student died when the plane crashed in central NSW in 2021.
Various media agencies now report that students are currently involved in taking a class action against Box Hill Institute, which is listed on the Victorian Supreme Court website. Putting aside these issues, students complained that their VET FEE Help courses were very poorly constructed and included sub-standard planes and training material from other colleges.
As reported in the news on 21 November 2019:
“According to witnesses, the teenager’s thumb became caught up in the saw before being sliced off”.
As reported by the ABC news on 23 December 2011:
“A coroner has described a New South Wales TAFE report on the death of a student in a horse fall as being "not worth the paper it was written on".”
This incident was subsequent to the 18-year-old Newcastle student learning to ride a horse as part of a TAFE jillaroo course at Dubbo in New South Wales. The following video from ABC News reports on this tragic incident.
The Coroner in the case of Sarah Waugh (Ms Sharon Freund) slammed the investigation conducted by TAFE and WorkCover considered whether to take “enforcement or prosecution action” as a result of the incident. Ms Freund made a number of recommendations, including to ASQA. Consequently, ASQA suspended the core units of competency from that qualification to prevent enrolment in the full qualification and NSW TAFE were fined $300K in the NSW District Court.
On 28 May 2020, the Sydney Morning Herald reported that the NSW Teachers Federation called out TAFE NSW ‘TAFE NSW had been swamped with 100,000 enrolments for its free courses as teachers raise concerns about their quality’.
At the time, the Prime Minister was reported to have said that he would renegotiate the national skills and workforce agreement because it was ‘fundamentally flawed’ with the States and Territories ‘...to apply stricter rules on how it spends $1.5 billion in federal funding each year’. While at the time, Maxine Sharkey, the Deputy Secretary of the NSW Teachers Federation, was quoted as saying that as far as quality was concerned, it was a race to the bottom; Yet, here we are again, just two years later, with free TAFE courses again being called out due to concerns over their quality.
It is highly unlikely that you will find similar incidents with private providers; I’m not aware of any, I could be wrong, but I have never heard of similar incidents with private providers. I don’t pretend to know why or even hazard a guess because pre-empting the regulator never works, especially one that effectively reports to and is accountable to nobody.
For many years, RTO Doctor has specialised in assisting providers who have been issued with an intention to sanction or a decision to sanction. We see providers when they have been audited by ASQA as a result of making changes to their registration (adding courses, premises, re-registration, etc.), or they have been, for example, subject to complaint investigations that ASQA has determined are substantiated or partially substantiated. RTO Doctor supports these providers in their appeal processes at various stages of the process, often in consultation with legal advisors who specialise in what has become known as ‘RTO Law’.
In the almost 12 years of trading as RTO Doctor, I have seen a lot of things that I have seriously questioned, many I have discussed in live videos, others I have written about in LinkedIn articles, and others I have written about in my publications. However, I have never seen a private college that remains trading despite having been involved in incidents such as those above. What I have seen is:
“Based on the findings of this review, ASQA has confidence that you have suitable self-assurance systems and practices for
delivering quality training and assessment in line with the requirements under the legislation and therefore, we do not need
to conduct a further review and will grant your renewal of registration on receiving the application”.
This risk assessment is even more concerning given the risk assessment outcome was identified as ‘low’ and the report was finalised on 17 June 2022, after these student complaints and concerns were raised with ASQA. In all transparency, however, it is possible that the date in the footer of the report that is different to the date on the front page may, in fact, have been a previous finding prior to rectification, although it appears strange that ASQA could possibly find Chisholm TAFE low risk as at 2 March 2022 (the date in the footer) because 1] the student complaints precede that date also but 2] because no auditor in their right mind could possibly find evidence to support a finding of low risk against all of the evidence provided in the student complaints, the low-risk finding is just not supported by the evidence. This leads us all to the burning question of “what happened?”.
As reported by the ABC on 22 July 2022, students at Chisholm were advised that they would be:
“...unable to do their placements in aged care homes because the right paperwork was not in place...Chisholm Online representatives told students
there were some "compliance issues" that had to be rectified and they didn't know when the students would be able to
proceed with their studies…Nine months after they started, students are still in limbo, unable to finish
subjects nor complete placements due to the issues”.
The Standards for Registered Training Organisations (RTOs) 2015 (“Standards for RTOs”) are explicit in relation to a provider’s inability to offer a course for which it has enrolled students.
Clause 5.3(c)(ii) states, “Where the RTO collects fees from the individual learner, either directly or through a third party, the RTO provides or directs the learner to information prior to enrolment or the commencement of training and assessment, whichever comes first, specifying…the learner’s right to obtain a refund for services not provided by the RTO in the event… the RTO fails to provide the agreed services”.
In addition to the Standards for RTOs, an RTO must also ensure it complies with its obligations under the National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011 (Cth). In other words, if an RTO is unable to deliver the course, it must, in accordance with its registration requirements under sections 21 (Complying with conditions), 22 (Compliance with the VET Quality Framework) and 22A (Commitment and capability to deliver quality vocational education and training) at a bare minimum. It would be unheard of for a private RTO to be in this position for over nine months and still be permitted to retain their students and their registration.
Section 2A of the National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011 (Cth) states that the objectives of the legislation include:
In reviewing the issues raised in this article, it is clear that not only has the national VET regulator failed to meet its obligations historically, but it continues to fail to meet its obligations despite the various reviews surrounding its performance over the years, including the Braithwaite and Joyce Reviews and the recent review by the Australian National Audit Office (“ANAO”). Indeed, 12 months ago, the ANAO found that “ASQA is not yet fully effective in planning and implementing the reform to the regulation of the VET sector” despite being in receipt of $24.1 million of funding allocated to reform activities. Yet here we are.
As anyone who works with the media knows, not everything you say does indeed get published and only certain information that you provide will ever be reported. Over the period of a few days last week, I was interviewed by ABC News in relation to this article and this news report (fast forward to the 8-minute 40-second mark). As one might imagine, a lot was said, but not a lot was actually broadcast to the public, possibly because the issues discussed are far too complex (and perhaps boring) for the general public to understand. In all transparency, I am also providing a summary of the topics that I also discussed that were not recorded and my personal ‘run sheet’ for the news report. I will discuss the topics in the order of the run sheet, although this is not the order in which they were discussed during the interview.
One of the very first things that I said in the interview was that the VET sector has, for the most part, very well-intentioned people who give so much to the sector but they are handcuffed by red tape, unnecessary and sometimes discriminatory regulatory interference, capacity for innovation, fear of getting on the wrong side of the regulator, etc.
For the most part, many people have dedicated much of their career to enhancing and sustaining the VET sector, others are ending their professional careers and want to give back, perhaps leave a legacy by passing on what they know to the next generation, others who have a burning passion for their industry area and others who are driven by other motivating factors. There are, in my experience, very few people (comparatively) whose sole motivation is to be a part of something unethical, ‘dodgy’ as some might call it, funding predators and the like involved in this industry, despite what the media and the regulators would have you believe. I mean that just because a provider has been sanctioned (appeal or not), does not equate to them being a ‘dodgy’ provider. Just as I am not saying that just because a provider is a public provider that they are the best and most compliant providers around.
TAFE providers have some great benefits that many RTOs cannot provide such as access to far more learning support staff, location (geography, especially in the regions), space, access to innovation, significantly more funding and a much larger variety of courses on offer all the time. Private providers, however, also have some great benefits that many TAFEs cannot provide, such as specialist, niche courses, more one-on-one support and a more friendly, community-minded type feeling, some might even say a family-type feeling, particularly for those smaller, niche providers. Both types of providers have important benefits, and both providers have their own set of disadvantages too. For the most part, though, everyone is generally trying to do their best and is genuinely well-intentioned.
The VET sector is incredibly complex and it doesn’t matter how many attempts at reform have been experienced over the past few decades; instead of getting simpler, it gets harder each and every day. Unlike the Higher Education sector, which is self-accrediting, the VET sector must comply with training packages and accredited courses, meaning that VET training products are not self-accredited. The sector caters to so many different industries which are themselves dynamic and change frequently. While many would say that the regulatory requirements themselves have changed a lot over the years, a closer inspection shows that the standards themselves have not really changed that much, just their structure, format and implementation have. Things that were once upon a time suitable now are often found unsuitable or far off the mark (sometimes all in the same day, creating even more confusion). Student needs have changed as well as industry and employer expectations. Government intervention and expectations of the sector fluctuate from being critical before the sector collapses to a precious ideal held by those in ivory towers who have perhaps never set foot in an RTO in any operational capacity.
The VET sector has been a political football for many, many years, some would argue far too many years. It seems every time there’s a new government, there’s a change in direction, more funding, less funding, more regulation, and less red tape…it’s a constant game of policy change, showboating and ego enhancement, all at the taxpayer’s expense and usually with the promise that ‘it’s in the public interest’. It’s not just felt at the point of regulation either. Political interference is rampant in other areas too, the least of which has had plenty of public air time and is in the midst of a review - stacking of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and let’s not forget the ongoing, significant interference of the country’s immigration policies! Immigration is caught up in the VET sector in so many different ways that it would take more than this article to discuss them however it is worthwhile mentioning at least 2 of those ways being international education and Australia’s General Skilled Migration program and the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (“ANZSCO”). You can learn more about this by reading another article I wrote on the topic.
As I discussed in my last book ‘The Human Toll: Is Regulation under the Australian Skills Quality Authority Destructive?’:
“...there are many applications being approved that have left many observers completely gobsmacked with outcomes that are completely unjustifiable! The level of inconsistency in auditing performance in our opinion has worsened to a degree never seen before. It is our experience that the quality of auditing that has been taking place for the past 6 months at least has dramatically deteriorated and some providers are getting away with significant breaches.”
Twelve months and several key reviews later, forming a critical component of the $26.1 million federally funded dollars allocated for the purpose of reform activities, the situation has not changed. In fact, in many ways, the situation is probably worse. We are seeing more and more applications being approved without audit because the CEO signs a declaration confirming that they are compliant with their registration requirements and in the context of ASQA’s ‘new approach’ to regulation is based on Self-Assurance.
In other words, ASQA would argue that in an environment of self-assurance and in declaring that you are compliant, they will approve an application and come back in whatever timeframe they wish under a compliance monitoring audit and full cost recovery measures to determine whether you are compliant or not. Changes to the appeal process mean that any attempt at appealing a decision in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal will be significantly delayed until you have exhausted all internal appeals mechanisms with ASQA (and possibly your bank balance) under that full cost recovery model.
Audit inconsistency still raises its ugly head for a range of reasons, including but not limited to auditor subjectivity and opinions versus legislatively required evidence, the capacity for interpretation of the Standards for RTOs, auditors lacking appropriate experience and expertise when conducting ‘performance assessments’, and that’s not even taking into account the conflict of interest in the full cost recovery model whereby it is in auditors (especially if they’re a panel auditor) and ASQA’s best interests to ensure that the audit is dragged out. While it is also acknowledged that ASQA encourages the sector to believe that it no longer conducts audits but rather performs ‘performance assessments’, one should not be misled by semantics…these performance assessment reports very quickly use the term ‘audits’! Many other aspects of the system lead to audit inconsistencies, including but not limited to industry standards and licensing, accreditation or registration requirements for some professions inconsistent with the training package requirements.
The whole concept of training packages (or should we call them assessment packages?) is in and of itself a vast contributor to uncertainty, inconsistency and a significant influence on what is ultimately deemed compliant. So many training packages are so poorly written that it wouldn’t matter what you delivered or who audited you, you would almost, without doubt, be considered not compliant. Add audit inconsistency issues raised above into the mix, and you have a recipe for disaster. In today’s regulatory environment, it is sadly, completely possible for a provider to be:
Sound like chaos? Absolutely! Yet these are the complex fights that RTOs (both public and private) face every single day. It is easily demonstrated how absurd this concept of non-compliance actually operates in the real world.
As I expressed in Friday's interview for ABC News (albeit the comments were edited out), I am extremely concerned by an upcoming change to the industry on 1 January 2023 when ASQA becomes responsible for training package assurance. As I said in the interview if ASQA still can’t get its legislated functions right despite the amount of time and money that has been invested in its reform activities, how on earth will it be capable of ensuring training package assurance as well? I mean, the quality of regulation to date has been ineffective, the quality of audit reports has been less than satisfactory, and by way of example, as demonstrated by the concepts of audit inconsistency above, including the competency of auditors, their experience and qualifications generally and this is a significant recipe for disaster…ASQA just does not have the capacity to undertake this function as well.
When the COVID-19 global pandemic hit Australia, a significant majority of RTOs, including TAFE began delivery online because of the restrictions and complexity of delivering face-to-face. So over two years ago, the entire industry engaged in a transition to online delivery; those who didn’t either closed their doors or went into hibernation. TAFE continued to operate and operated in the same way many other RTOs did - Online. Therefore, more than two years later, how is it that Chisholm TAFE finds itself in this position? What about all of those students who were trained and assessed in the past two years or so when Chisholm’s delivery was switched to online like many others? Did they have these issues? Are there students with qualifications that were not compliant and should be cancelled or rescinded? What about those breaches of the National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011, such as (but not limited to):
ASQA has previously cancelled qualifications that were affected by breaches of the provisions above and some RTOs fined for other breaches of the National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011. As we saw earlier in this article, TAFE has already been fined in the past for matters related to their delivery of VET, there is no reason why this situation should not be any different.
I don’t believe that many people would argue that the health and community services industries are ripe for the potential to compromise community safety. As was discussed earlier, some of the core units of competency in CHC43315 - Certificate IV in Mental Health alone, if not delivered and assessed appropriately, place the community at significant risk of harm. All it would take is for one graduate of the Certificate IV in Mental Health to be involved in a suicide or crisis situation (for which, according to the training package, they are qualified to do), yet their training and assessment was so poor that they were never appropriately qualified and it only emerges when the graduate is in industry and embroiled in such an event. It should not have to come to this. It should never come to incidents such as those plane crashes, the young girl killed while participating in a horse-riding course, or a student who in gaining a qualification has their thumb accidentally amputated. These events (or, in the context of London Bridge, human sacrifices) happened while they were still learning; what can possibly happen when students are qualified and graduated and working in industry?
Importantly, this is not the first warning at Chisholm TAFE in the health and community services industries, leading one to question the low-risk rating they received in that risk review finalised just a few weeks ago. According to the national register of VET training.gov.au, on 1 April 2019, Chisholm had a condition placed on its registration in relation to HLT54115 - Diploma of Nursing (or its successor) until and unless it is removed from scope. It is worthwhile noting that this course remains on Chisholm’s scope and has been superseded, the replacement course HLT541210 - Diploma of Nursing, was released in April this year (it shows when you tick the box ‘Display history’). The condition related to maintaining ANMAC accreditation and compliance with all of its ANMAC accreditation requirements effective immediately (and according to the national register, remains in place). On the basis of this condition alone, one must ask the question, how does Chisholm TAFE then achieve a risk rating of low and get a renewal of registration with no further conditions for seven years without an audit?
As an aside, Chisholm is still promoting the superseded HLT54115 - Diploma of Nursing despite it being superseded almost 15 months ago and the new qualification HLT541210 - Diploma of Nursing is not available on their scope of registration. Of additional interest is the fact that it is also a ‘Free TAFE for Priority course’ as part of the Victorian Government’s investment of $1 billion in TAFE and training. According to the Chisholm TAFE website:
“Free TAFE for Priority Courses came into effect on 1 January 2019, reducing the financial barrier for students wanting to train in courses that lead to jobs in demand from Victorian employer.”
“Free TAFE for Priority Courses covers tuition fees for priority courses for students who are eligible for government-subsidised training. There may still be some costs, such as student services fees or materials fees, under Free TAFE.”
In closing, compliance in the VET sector is often complex, highly subjective and perception based. In other words, what one person says is compliant, another person will say it is not. It’s that subjectivity, interpretation and opinions that I referred to earlier. What is concerning, over and above all of this, is how the public interest has been managed in respect to such issues. If issues in the sector are so complex that practitioners and even the regulator don’t understand them or are able to come to an agreement, then what hope does the public have? Do they even know about these incidents? Are they aware of them? Community safety must prevail. A full, independent, and comprehensive investigation into the issues exposed by ABC News last week must immediately take place and the findings made available to the public.
Further, that investigation should extend to those qualifications and statements of attainment issued to students at least since Chisholm TAFE commenced online delivery of the qualification, if not since its initial delivery was implemented. The public must be able to trust that any certification issued under the Australian Qualifications Framework, whether it be issued by a public or private provider, ensures that the graduate has met all relevant requirements and is capable of performing the role required. The investigation should also ensure that these issues are not systemic and do not affect other courses being provided by Chisholm TAFE. Albeit it is highly likely (at least in accordance with ASQA’s audit principles and practices) that if this is being identified in one or two courses, it is likely that all of the courses that they offer are impacted.
Additionally, a full investigation into any funding contract that allows Chisholm to run these ‘FREE TAFE Courses Online’ must be investigated and the sum of money allocated or already paid be accounted for. Chisholm should be forced to repay that funding when such training and assessment is found to be not compliant, just as any private provider would be expected to do. For those students who might not have been eligible for funding and have paid any amount upfront, they should immediately be provided with a refund of any courses fees not already expended and provided with a transfer to another provider who has the capability to deliver the course and provide the students with the qualification they were seeking enrolment in.
Finally, the Education Services for Overseas Students Act 2000 (Cth) (“ESOS Act”) provides a good example of legislation that is intentionally designed to protect students in the event of provider default. Section 46A of the ESOS Act provides as follows:
There are very specific obligations on providers, including the timeframe in which those obligations must be discharged, that are also legislated in section 46. They will not be covered here but can be sighted in the legislation itself. Similar provisions exist in the Higher Education Support Act 2003 commencing in section 166-1 as provided below:
The National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011 must be revised to incorporate similar provisions.
here is no need for Humpty Dumpty to have any further falls if it only performs its legislative obligations in a competent manner, just like there is no need for London Bridge to fall down and no further human sacrifices made because of these unacceptable issues.
As I said at the outset of this article, this article is not about public versus private. It is an article about how many more lives must be lost or severely impacted because of the issues that have now been exposed by the media. How safe is the community in relation to these courses? What measures will be put in place to ensure that these issues don’t happen again and that any public or private provider who finds themselves in such a situation is subject to an independent and comprehensive investigation with remediation and rectification provided? Bearing in mind that fatalities, paraplegia, life-long disability and amputations are not capable of being remediated, those traumas will, unfortunately, leave permanent scars on victims and their loved ones; there is no remedy for that.
What are your thoughts?
Share below in the comments.
RTO Doctor assists VET & international education providers around the country to ensure their compliance with their regulatory requirements; a critical issue for RTOs around the nation currently experiencing a very hostile and punitive regulatory environment. Raelene Bartlett, Founding Director of RTO Doctor published the book CRICOS CPR: Top 5 Tips to Rescue Your RTO as a way of supporting providers in navigating this minefield. She has also published the number 1 international bestseller in 3 categories "National Vocational Education and Training Regulator Act 2011 (Cth): An Investigation Into Merits Review" and 'The Human Toll: Is The Nature of Regulation Under The Australia Skills Quality Authority Destructive?'
If you think as an RTO this issue is not relevant to you, you might be surprised to learn that you are. Many RTOs and trainers and assessors think that to comply, all they need to do is hold a valid and current Working With Children card or similar at a bare minimum - so much more than this is required though. If you're in Victoria, the VRQA has just released today (5 May 2022) an email to subscribers regarding the commencement of the new Child Safe Standards coming into effect on 1 July 2022. The following extract on the VRQA website is particularly relevant:
"From 1 July 2022, new VRQA Guidelines for VET Providers come into effect. They add an additional key area to the 5 in the current guidelines:
RTOs that deliver, or intend to deliver, services to persons under 18 years of age are required to comply with the Child Safe Standards.To download the new guidelines, see: New VRQA Guidelines for VET Providers (docx - 2.24mb)"
Not yet sure what this means for you? Watch the short video from the Commission for Children and Young People below.
If your emergency is urgent, we will do our best to contact you within a few hours. If your emergency is non-urgent, we will contact you within 48 hours.