Diversidad de actores en la gestión de proyectos y de políticas

A. Expansion in demand

PNG is experiencing rapid growth in the age group most likely to seek pre-employment TVET, and in participation in the school grades which give access to TVET and to higher education. Taking the demographic effect alone, the numbers of people aged 15-24 is projected to grow by 40% between 2010 and 2015. The recent abolition of school tuition fees is likely to accelerate these trends. Older people, who did not have the chance to get vocational qualifications in their youth or need to renew their skills, also seek TVET. A number of enterprises see the need to upgrade workforce skills in order to take advantage of new opportunities. The costs of meeting the increased demand for tertiary education – in universities as well as TVET – will be very high. How those costs are shared between the taxpayers, the students and employers will have important implications for the level of demand, for equity and the effectiveness of training.

B. TVET pathways and qualification structures

Ideally young people seeking vocational qualifications would have clear pathways open to them so that they could proceed through entry-level courses in schools and VTCs, to higher levels of certification and diplomas at the technical colleges, and degrees in the universities, as well as having multiple points of entry to the labour market. The same framework of qualifications would apply to the private sector, so that students have choices between public and private provision as they climb the ladder of vocational qualification. This concept is well understood in PNG but the qualification structures to underpin it are not yet fully in place. The PNGQF-TVET, jointly owned by the NTC and the NDoE, offers competency-based training at the standard four levels of certificate and two levels of diploma, but:

 NC1 and NC2 are not yet the standard entry-level qualifications either in VTCs or in the RTOs which cater for new entrants to the system;

 there are very few courses as yet in the public colleges at National Certificate 3 or Certificate 4 levels. Certificate 2 completers find that their pathway has petered out; and

 Alongside the PNGQF-TVET there is a parallel system (Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3) used for apprentice training and trade tests. Recommendations from previous

studies to examine the alignment of apprenticeship training with PNGQF-TVET do not appear to have been implemented

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The PNGNQF, which applies to higher education, is owned by the Commission for Higher Education. It too offers four levels of certificate and two of diploma, but the level descriptors are different from those in the PNGQF-TVET. PNGNQF, unlike PNGQF-TVET, includes criteria for the length of course. Articulation from the one framework to the other is not assured, but subject to the caveat ‘Bridging Studies if Required’.

These are in effect two separate sector-based qualification frameworks, neither of which is aligned to international qualifications frameworks. As reported by many stakeholders, the existence of separate qualification frameworks and their lack of international recognition causes confusion and limits opportunities for people from PNG. Within the TVET sector there are still major challenges to introduce PNGQF-TVET qualifications in all relevant levels and fields of study, and to fund the teaching of them by appropriately trained teachers using suitable accommodation, learning resources and equipment.

C. The boundaries of TVET

The public TVET system is usually thought of in PNG as TBCs and the VTCs, with the technical schools and community colleges as new entrants to field. The one national polytechnic at Lae combines the business and trade technology fields of study taught in the TBCs, but does not go much beyond them. The institutions are generally small by international standards.

There are many publicly funded institutions delivering vocational qualifications below Bachelor level; primary teachers colleges, nursing colleges, specialist providers of ports training, maritime training and in some cases universities. Some of these are sited adjacent to members of the current TVET system. There are thus opportunities to explore whether the establishment of further polytechnics or centres of excellence which transcend the current institutional boundaries might deliver valuable synergies which would raise the quality of what could be delivered for any given level of funding.

There is also a boundary issue relating to the vocational training centres, and potentially the community colleges. Are the VTCs a part of general education alongside the secondary schools, or are they TVET providers? The policy of the TVET Wing of NDoE is to steer them gradually towards the PNGQF-TVET courses characteristic of TVET providers. But within the standard depiction of the National Education System they appear as a pathway parallel to secondary schools. They are funded in the same way as lower secondary schools, including as from 2013 100% Government subsidy of tuition fees. If free tuition leads to a large expansion of lower secondary education, the original rationale for the VTCs is undermined. To re-establish the VTCs as providers of competency-based TVET will be expensive.

There is also a competition issue. If courses for National Certificates1 and 2 are free at VTCs and subject to substantial fees at TBCs and private providers, there are risks of unfairness to private providers, and a loss of fee income which adds to the burden on the PNG taxpayer of sustaining the system. The risks are small at the moment, because there are not many PNGQF-TVET courses in the VTCs, but that is the direction in which the system is heading. D. Governance of the TVET system and overview of funding priorities

We set out in Table 4.1 the complex arrangements through which the NDoE, NTC, OHE and NATTB share responsibilities for the supervision of the TVET system. The search for simpler and more unified arrangements has been going on for some years. The matter lay outside the scope of the present study. But it is pervasive, applying for example just as much to funding issues, as to qualification frameworks.

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Resources are allocated as they are as the result of ad hoc decisions taken by a number of different stakeholders responding to the pressures as they perceived them. PNG stakeholders recognise the rationale for the individual elements of the budget allocation, but no one party ever had the opportunity or power to look at the picture as a whole.

Perhaps in consequence of this fragmentation of governance there is no sector-wide strategy for TVET which engages employers and builds on industry needs, includes the private sector, and defines the respective roles of GoPNG and provinces in the delivery and supervision of TVET. Responsibility for structured training for the informal economy remains unclear.

E. Access to TVET and the role of provinces

There is a growing demand for access to TVET nearer home. ‘A polytechnic in every region, a TBC in every province, a VTC and a community college in every district’ are all popular cries, and hard to gainsay within the PNG political system. There is much to be said for them in terms of equity for students, making TVET responsive to local needs, and reducing boarding and travel costs. But the sustainability of a much larger network of TVET institutions, and the roles of the provinces and other players, are at issue.

If a province is able to get a TBC established in its area as a national institution simply by offering some unmodernised premises for the purpose and on the basis that GoPNG will take responsibility for all costs going forward, then it is an easy option for the province. That seems to be more or less what has been happening up to now. A province is more likely to assess the local demand for TVET carefully if it is required to take a larger financial stake in the new college, and such an approach is consistent with the current government’s initiative in resourcing provinces and districts to play a much bigger part in infrastructure investment. One large private provider has offered to establish campuses on a public-private partnership basis with provinces willing to provide premises and pay for their maintenance and utilities. Courses will be within the Australian Qualifications Framework. Teaching costs would be covered by fees, preferably with some input of scholarships by the province. Agreements have already been reached with two provinces to proceed on this basis. Such partnerships between provinces and the private sector offer another way to share responsibility and risk, rather than putting the whole burden on the national budget.

The VTCs already constitute a wide network, though not yet one in every district. To judge from the data on VTC students per thousand population, there is much variation between provinces in their commitment to the VTC concept. Perhaps one thing which the community college pilots need to establish is what these colleges have to offer to their client group, including the rural disadvantaged and those seeking a second chance in education, and whether that offer is better delivered through a separate network of colleges, or main- streamed through the vocational training centres. The national roll-out of yet another institutional type and funding modality would need a firm rationale.

Rural disadvantage is an important issue for PNG. So too is educational access for females. Women form about one-third of TVET students, varying from about half in business and hospitality, to very low proportions in some areas of trade technology, and in apprentice training. In part this is an issue which needs to be addressed earlier in the educational cycle – fewer girls obtain the school grades needed to enter the TVET system. But scholarships and other incentives may have a part to play in encouraging more female entrants to pre- employment training in trade technology, and to apprenticeships.

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It lay outside our scope to examine how employers make input to TVET qualifications and the governance of TVET institutions. Those who have done so report a level of disengagement, which the response to our approaches to employers tends to confirm. We did observe that many employers seem unhappy with the quality of publicly funded TVET, some to the extent that they have organised their own extension courses for apprentices rather than send them to the technical colleges. Where these courses are open to apprentices from other firms, the fees are much higher than the TBCs are permitted to charge for such courses. This situation indicates that employers are willing to pay more for courses taught on modern equipment and by well-motivated, business-oriented staff.

G. The role of fees and student support

In 2013 the fee for a full year of study at a TBC was K5930 for a boarding student, K3755 for a day student. GDP per capita is about K5000. So fees are a heavy burden on the average family unless the student gets a scholarship. At a private college delivering qualifications equivalent to PNQF-TVET qualifications the fees would be similar to the TBC level or higher. University fees are slightly higher than TBC fees.

As things stand about one-third of TBC students get HECAS support which covers about one- third of the boarding fee. Many more, and more valuable, HECAS awards are available to the university sector. Private colleges can offer HECAS scholarships only if they are recognised as institutions of higher education, which few are. Currently GoPNG spends three times as much on a special scheme – Independence Fellowships – for the rural disadvantaged as it does on HECAS for TVET students. Some students not on HECAS are able to obtain scholarships from their home province or other sources, but many cannot. In 2013 expenditure on TVET scholarships by provinces and other local sources was much greater than the cost to GoPNG of HECAS.

In principle loans are an option for making student support more widely available and moderating the taxpayer cost. But an effective mechanism to recover loans in the PNG context has yet to be found. Meanwhile issues for GoPNG include:

 to clarify whether support for TVET students is a national or local responsibility;  whether to base eligibility for support as now on the type of institution attended, or on

the type of TVET course undertaken;

 whether to put more resource into TVET student support, or keep it roughly at the present level, on the grounds that the priority for any additional resource should be teaching; and

 whether to make access to student support more equal between universities, public TVET institutions and private TVET providers.

H. A broader base of funding

Governments seeking to broaden the funding base of a public service may rein back their own commitment, and then watch what happens; if the service is valued other parties may come in to support it, or supply alternatives. In effect, GoPNG has done that with TVET. The private sector has expanded its enrolments in business studies and allied fields, a number of employers have opened up courses for apprentices, and some provinces have started scholarship schemes. It would be consistent with such a strategy to deregulate TBC fees, or at least raise the fee limits annually in line with price changes. In practice the NEB has been reluctant to agree to fee increases because of the impact on families, which could be tempered by the introduction of additional needs-based scholarships. As things stand, with a squeeze on public funding and erosion of fees in real terms, the public colleges have suffered a loss of quality and esteem.

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The training levy has had modest success in its present form. It imposes on the IRC a heavy burden for the assessment of qualifying training expenses. There is a need for much greater transparency about the yield of the levy and about the procedures for allocating it, and for an analysis of whether it serves to increase the training undertaken by employers incurring qualifying training expenses. The Training Assistance Fund resourced from the levy is the only funding source for some TVET needs, notably to assist the smaller RTOs to retrain staff and re-equip for the introduction of courses under PNGNQF-TVET.

The universities have found that it is feasible to put on distance education TVET courses and other provision for post experience students at fees which at least cover costs. The TBCs may have some scope to do the same.

I. Structured training for the informal economy

This kind of training depends for the most part on the initiative of non-government organisations and entrepreneurs, often working in partnership with VTCs and private providers. The NGOs source funding from the provinces (at least in NCD), directly from donors or, in the case of SDTF, via an endowment fund. IATP offers another model in the Islands Region, with provinces paying for training on behalf of farmers.

In the main, GoPNG is not greatly involved in training for the informal economy – indeed it is not clear whose responsibility it would be to take the initiative. The exception is the Independence Fellowship Scheme which pays for longer courses than most other providers, designed to equip the rural disadvantaged to establish projects (in effect micro-businesses). There is much more training of this type than we were able to see, and many more stakeholders are involved. The issue is how to replicate the good practice and make it more widely available in PNG. This needs strong backing to get going on a significant scale, as the GGBDF and IATP examples show. There may be a role for GoPNG in this regard by: publicising the achievements of the best schemes and working with donors to bring entrepreneurs and backers together in provinces where that is not yet happening; and assuring quality and accountability where GoPNG funds or overseas aid is used to support the sector.

J. Information and data

Good information and data about TVET are needed by:

 governments, national and provincial, to formulate policies, and to carry them through;

 institutions to manage their affairs and improve their operations;  students to make informed choices; and

 employers to help recruit skilled employees.

Information gathering is conducted for public sector TVET by the NDoE and the OHE who are running parallel statistical collections which lack common standards and have uneven coverage. As a result it is difficult to get basic information on student, lecturer and graduate numbers, fields and levels of study. Simple indicators like SSR, cost per FTE student and cost per graduate are hard to generate. Obtaining data from the providers is not easy. Both NDoE and OHE have to run their data collections on slim resources. On the face of it, both organisations stand to gain from closer collaboration.

TVET statistics should in principle cover the private as well as the public sector. As things stand, just keeping the Register of Training Organisations is an exacting task for the NTC.

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There is still much to do to publish a comprehensive register and keep it up to date. The NTC website is attractive and, within its limits, informative. But NTC staffing appears much tighter than that of NDoE TVET Wing or OHE.

As well as statistics about TVET, the planning of TVET needs good labour market information. There are no regular statistics about the PNG labour market – a gap which needs to be filled for reasons which go much wider than TVET. Meanwhile NDoE and OHE have shown interest in tracer studies, to follow the progress of their graduates into their first destination after graduation. Tracer studies could be valuable in improving the fit between the output of the TVET system and the needs of employers.

It is to be hoped that the data compiled and collected for this study can provide a baseline of key indicators that can be progressively added to over time. However, to achieve this