From the General Secretary

Fully resourcing TAFE is a must

By Mary Franklyn General Secretary

TAFE and the State Election

On 13 March Western Australians will go to the polls for a state election. This will be a crucial election for public education. The SSTUWA has a comprehensive plan to help WA’s public schools, and their students, recover from COVID-19 and prepare them for the challenges of the future by Putting Our Kids First. One of the key areas the union is campaigning for is the TAFE sector. TAFE has been a well-established and trusted symbol for technical and further education in WA for many decades. It has a long history of positive outcomes and is a vital institution within our society. We all know someone who has benefited from receiving an education through TAFE or is in the process of receiving one. It makes economic and fiscal sense to fund a system that continues to punch above its weight in terms of outcomes versus funding. We congratulate the state government for the recent $57 million recovery package for the WA TAFE and training sector through the reduction in fees and short courses, which will enable many in the community to access TAFE. The investment of $167.4 million in TAFE infrastructure is also welcomed. However, this also brings new challenges of meeting the subsequent increase in activity. We have four key areas that will enable TAFE to meet these challenges and continue to play its special role in supporting the WA economy.

Quality teaching, training and learning

If the Western Australian government wants to support quality delivery and learning experiences, funding must be provided to ensure that learning and skills development is to the depth and breadth required by the key stakeholders: students, communities, industries, employers and the government. To understand the need to adequately fund delivery and learning it is critical to have an awareness of what it takes to create and maintain quality learning experiences; cater for students with special needs; ensure appropriate and safe class sizes; develop and implement blended modes of delivery where appropriate based on course content and student cohort; support delivery and assessment in face-to-face classes for positive outcomes for all.

Professional development and training

Professional development for lecturers is not adequately funded under the current resource allocation model despite growing needs and compliance requirements. Funding needs to be allocated to support lecturers developing innovative delivery and learning initiatives. These funds need to be sufficient to provide lecturers with time, resources and other relevant assistance.

This includes funding to properly support TAFE lecturers in gaining teacher qualifications. In addition, there is an enormous need for resourcing the necessary professional development in specialist industry areas as well as facilitating return-to-industry programs.

Information technology

Substantial additional funding is required for systemic ICT infrastructure (hardware and software), support (immediate on-campus support availability), maintenance, connectivity and training. This is vital to the provision of highquality education, especially with new and emerging industries requiring a highly skilled workforce.

Counselling services

Adequate and guaranteed funding needs to be provided for professional psychological, counselling, social welfare and career support services for students. TAFE organisations are now of a size to accommodate a small team of professionals, led by a qualified psychologist, to undertake a range of counselling and support functions such as career counselling and transition support; psychological counselling; personal counselling and social welfare support. You can go to puttingourkidsfirst.com.au for more detail on our key campaign asks, the background to what we are asking for and why, and to sign up to assist in helping our message be heard.

Bushfire response

We know many of our members have been directly impacted by the recent bushfires. The Lord Mayor’s Appeal has been activated and you can visit appealswa.org.au to donate.

Getting Organised 2021

It has never been more important to get organised, with the upcoming state election, a new general agreement negotiation process starting late in the year and plenty of work still to be done around protecting our members’ interests. If you have an existing branch or want to form one at your workplace all the necessary materials have been posted to your workplace union rep. Where there is no rep the materials have been sent to the campus. You can also find every form and guidance note at sstuwa.org.au/GO21

State Council elections

The SSTUWA has received verbal advice that this year’s State Council elections will not be conducted by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC). Instead all current delegates will retain their positions as State Council delegates. The SSTUWA is awaiting formal written confirmation from the AEC and will update all delegates by email and all members via eNews as soon as possible.