Vocational Education & Training (VET) – Melton
Young people in the West have just been granted an astounding coup. The funding provided by the Commonwealth Government to support the delivery of vocational education through the building of Trade Training Centres in the West will go a long way to helping young people achieve independence.
These Trade Training Centres will provide an enormous boost to young people to gain the skills they need to enter the workforce. Employers often say that employing young people can sometimes be touch and go because young people don’t have the required skills. Young people who study a vocational education and training (VET) course are so much better prepared for work, not just in the specific trade skill area, but by also gaining ‘employability skills’. These skills are those that many of us take for granted, but for a young person who has never been to work and, who sometimes doesn’t have a role model at home, they don’t necessarily come naturally.
Young people who have a chance to experience the world of work in a supportive environment will soon understand the importance of getting to work on time, wearing the ‘right gear’, taking initiative while bouncing ideas off work mates and communicating individually and in a team. There is no doubt that VET provides this experience and much more. Vocational education is geared to a different learning style – it is applied learning that provides students with increased motivation, improved organisational skills, opportunities to explore a wider range of career pathways and links literacy and numeracy to practical applications, validating why they need to learn these skills.
It also opens networks for many young people; they understand the relevance of contacts in various workplaces and often gain a part time job from their exchanges with people they meet through their VET course. It helps them earn a wage while studying and will eventually provide a steady income when fully qualified in trade areas.
VET offers a practical way to learn (and earn!) and our young people will now have access to dozens more VET options, giving them more reasons to stay at school and more options when they leave.
Western Edge VET Cluster (Melton)
As with the Brimbank area, Melton schools have developed and participated in a very successful VET Cluster for over a decade. Government, Catholic and Independent schools have historically participated in a VET delivery model which demonstrates sound governance, equity and access, financial and accountability practices.
Over the decade The Western Access VET Cluster has grown to 11 member schools/providers offering 14 different VET subjects, catering for almost 400 students.
These statistics only relate to cluster provision and do not take into account of the additional subjects run within each school. Courses run in areas such as automotive, community services, fashion, hospitality, media, music and recreation.
The recent success of the BMLLEN led “Trade Training in Schools” application in the Melton area, has resulted in funding for new trade facilities in the following areas, i.e. Construction, Engineering, Electrotechnology and Hairdressing.