New body QVET aims to clean up the ‘rotten core’ of VET

A new representative body for vocational education and training aims to give colleges a reliable badge of quality to set them apart from dodgy practices in the industry.

QVET plans to offer vocational education and training colleges a reliable badge of quality.

A new representative body for vocational education and training will launch next month with the aim of providing education providers a reliable badge of quality to set them apart from dodgy practices in the industry.

QVET – a member-based, non-profit group – will invite the more than 4000 private registered training organisations that offer vocational courses to join if they pass a “rigorous, transparent quality audit process”, says one of its founders, Jonathan Marshall, who is a former chief executive of a private VET provider.

He said QVET was a grassroots effort to address the “real rotten core” of dodgy colleges offering vocational education and training. “We want to make it really clear-cut that there is an entity that industry and government can talk to that represents only high-quality providers,” he said.

The quality check of QVET membership applicants will start with a self-assessment and, once a potential member passes that, they move on to an onsite audit.

Vivek Sharma, another QVET founder, said the onsite audit would look at processes and practices and be conducted by qualified auditors who had been in the industry for many years.

Mr Sharma, who has more than 20 years’ experience in VET sector quality processes, said QVET would not be just another membership organisation looking for members. “We really want to make some change,” he said.

Mr Marshall said the quality being sought was more than just ticking boxes.

“This is shifting the culture so they (education providers) will embrace an audit as the chance to demonstrate quality,” he said.

QVET will be governed by a board of directors, which Mr Sharma will sit on, as well as taking on the role of director of quality. Mr Marshall will be the chief operating officer reporting to a still-to-be-appointed chief executive.

Mr Sharma said there were 40 to 50 VET providers interested in joining QVET.

Mr Marshall said he envisaged that QVET would work collaboratively with the regulator of the sector, the Australian Skills Quality Authority.

“Our focus is on the good providers, and we would like through that process, over time, to help the regulator focus on the bad providers, because we don’t want to be police,” he said.

Independent Tertiary Education Council Australia, which represents private VET providers, responded to QVET’s announcement by saying it already held “a pre-eminent position as the authoritative voice of registered training organisations with a commitment to excellence”.

“We see a lot of players come and go in this sector, setting up new associations and then closing them down a year or so later,” ITECA chief executive Troy Williams said. “They falter pretty quickly when they find that effective member-driven political advocacy is resource intensive, requiring long-term relationships at a parliamentary and departmental level to progress evidence-based policy solutions to complex problems.”

VET expert Claire Field, a former head of ITECA’s predecessor, the Australian Council of Private Education and Training, said “the intent of QVET is to be applauded”.

“Regrettably, more than a decade after national regulation was introduced into the VET sector, poor practice continues to flourish in pockets of the sector, denying students a quality educational experience and damaging the reputation of good providers and the sector as a whole,” Ms Field said.

She said that since her time as ACPET head, when the organisation had introduced “rigorous additional quality requirements for membership”, these measures had “regrettably” been wound back and government regulation alone was now relied on to ensure quality.

“The Australian VET sector desperately needs a mechanism like this (QVET) to restore badly damaged trust,” she said.

Mr Marshall said QVET was currently accepting membership applications through its website, qvet.com.au.