In early 2014 I wrote a paper on youth unemployment called Transition to Work, Training or Study. see http://www.life-skills.com.au/programoutline.php The core thrust of the paper was to find a better way of managing those young people with reasonably good prospects who are struggling to find their way into work, training or study. In the paper I also presented a new system for preparing young people for work or study in advance by up skilling them in work related proficiencies before placing them in work experience placements or ‘work mentorships’, while still supported by Youth Allowance. To complement my paper I also made a couple of YouTube videos to better explain my concept, and put them up on my website www.life-skills.com.au. Then I started lobbying. I contacted educators, welfare agencies, the job services and training organisations. I also met with a variety of people from welfare, education etc. I then wrote to almost every politician in the country and spoke to at least a dozen via formal meetings or over the phone.
The Federal Government’s response was to tell me there was no need for such a concept, because the issues were either being attended to via other policy initiatives, or they didn’t have the money. Then, in 2015, and much to my amusement, the Federal Government then presented their own policy on how to better manage young people struggling to find their way into work, training or study. They called it Transition to Work. In 2016 they then introduced another part of their strategy for placing young people in work experience placements or work internships while still supported by Youth Allowance (called PaTH).
Maybe it’s a coincidence…because great minds think alike. (at least that’s what I tell myself)
Here’s a breakdown of the two concepts.
My concept is called Transition to Work, Training or Study. Theirs are called Transition to Work and PaTH.
My concept identified the need for us to deal with young unemployed people separately from other unemployed people. At least now the Federal Government feels the same, despite originally insisting there was no such need. (and I’ve got the correspondence to prove it)
My concept recommended forming a new body to specifically manage young unemployed people. The Government’s Transition to Work concept is exactly that.
My concept identified a need for young people to be taught appropriate workplace behaviours. Theirs does too.
Mine identified a series of core ‘soft skills’ for young people to work on. Ditto.
Mine identified how important it is for young unemployed people to get work experience. Ditto.
Mine suggested volunteerism as another way for young people to improve their skills. Same.
Mine suggested a more universal approach to preparing young people for the workplace. Same.
Mine identified three types of young unemployed people. Same
Mine identified that the longer a young person is disengaged, the more difficult it is to reengage them. Same.
Mine identified the need for some young people with more substantial barriers to first gain assistance before taking part in the Transition program. Same.
Mine suggested that young people participate in a pre employment program that runs for 25-30 hours per week. The PaTH program allows for pre employment preparation using two blocks of three weeks, up to 25 hours a week.
Mine suggested that young people who don’t comply be returned to jobactive. Same.
Mine suggested placing young people in work experience ‘mentorships’, but only after the completion of the ten week training program/certification. The Governments Path program seeks to place young people into ‘internships’ with up to six weeks preparation.
Mine recommended that participants in work mentorships be permitted to maintain their Youth Allowance payment for the term of the placement. Same
My minimum term for a post training placement in a mentorship is 13 weeks. The minimum term for the Governments Path program is 4 weeks.
So, while I’m flattered that the Government has adopted a number of my recommendations, maybe it really is a coincidence, or a series of coincidences that we have so many things in common. But the thing that disappoints me most about their program is the ‘bare bones’ approach they’ve taken. It’s well documented that the Job Services were inefficient in their capacity to engage and assist so many young people who’d lost their way, but by my reckoning the Governments new concept is half hearted. But I do think the Path Program is a step in the right direction, though to offer a young person $100 for 25 hours of work is a travesty. And to allow them to only be placed for as little as 4 weeks is a waste of everyone’s time and barely long enough to improve their work-life routines and habits over the longer term.
I’m also wary of letting so many inexperienced young people loose in our workplaces without a standardised preparatory program, along with a set of clear guidelines for employers, but not so stifling as to discourage them from taking young people on. An ill-equipped and uninformed young person may be an accident waiting to happen. Most of the businesses I’ve spoken to said they’d be interested in taking a young person on at $200 – $250 per week. And while it’s still relatively inexpensive for the business, at least the young person is also suitably rewarded for their efforts. It’s also an amount that won’t ‘encourage’ employers to cease employing other employees, but especially because the period of the placement is capped.
Where my concept differs markedly from the government is that I recommended young people partake in a structured and standardised pre-employment program of ten weeks. The Governments Transition to Work concept allows for providers to determine the appropriate mix of individual, group and self-directed activities. This is somewhat removed from the intensive preparatory program suggested by a number of recent studies, and once again leaves the Transition to Work concept vulnerable to participant manipulation and poor governance, not too dissimilar to elements of jobactive.
I recommended offering young people a certification in Transition to Work, Training or Study via TAFE, thereby taking an intentionally educational approach to the issue, while at the same time making it accessible to every young person in the country. The Governments Transition to Work concept is contracted out to providers from across the country, with capped allocations, to run along similar lines to jobactive, whereby providers are remunerated for successful placements in work or study.
I also set out to specifically target and engage those young people who’ve dropped out of, or fallen out of university, other TAFE courses, employment or apprenticeships or traineeships. The Governments Transition to Work concept doesn’t make any specific references to these young people.
And while I’ve sought to itemise and address specific skills sets in a standardised and workable format (work readiness, life-skills, personal development and health and wellbeing), the Governments Transition to Work concept only recommends that providers have regular ongoing contact with participants to assist them gain access to, or refer them to, a range of programs.
The standardised set of intensive preparatory skills that I recommend for young people should be able to be accessed from just about anywhere. That’s why I recommended TAFE…because our secondary school curriculum is already jam packed, and more or less solely focused on academic outcomes. I’m also convinced that young people will be far more focused on job readiness as a goal if they are already potentially faced with some of the issues that arise in their post secondary lives. But seriously folks, isn’t a program like this perfect for TAFE?? The Governments Transition to Work concept offers a mix of individual, group and self-directed activities, to be delivered by a range of more localised providers. So once again we get a scattergun approach based on the efficiencies of localised providers (and funding models) rather than a standardised and measured approach.
My aim is to equip participants with a standardised certification that not only acknowledges their preparation for work, training or further study, it can also be presented to prospective employers as a genuine work ready certification. The Governments Transition to Work concept doesn’t offer any certification, and doesn’t offer employers any standardised sets of preparatory measures or skills that they can refer to or rely on.
I also recommend that participants in work mentorships have restrictions placed on the types of roles they can fulfil during placements. At the same time, employers will also be given a clear set of guidelines on how to manage the young person.
But I don’t recommend a $1000 placement payment to a business. Instead I recommend that businesses be ‘gifted’ with a reasonably well versed and prepared young person with some knowledge of the workings of the business and employment worlds. The Governments Path program offers the $1000 placement payment with the expectation that the businesses themselves will deliver their own workplace training. I don’t think this will work. I think businesses already have enough on their plate. I’d rather we give the kids a kick start with some of the basics, and then let the business add to it.
Unlike the Path program, I also don’t recommend payment of up to $10,000 to the business for employing the young person at the end of their placement. Instead I recommend that we place the young person in the business for a longer period…giving the business a chance to reap some of the rewards that come from investing in the young person in the first instance. I’d like to see the placement extended for up to 39 weeks, giving the young person an extended period of engagement on top of the ten week preparatory program. If they are offered a full 39 weeks, the young person could be engaged for almost 12 months. If you want to give a young person a head start, and at the same time reinforce positive life behaviours while engendering routine and structure into a young person’s life, then this is how to do it.
I also strongly recommend that the young participant in a work ‘mentorship’ be paid somewhere between $200 and $250 on top of their Youth Allowance payment for a 30 hour week. The Governments Path program recommends paying their placement interns $100 per week, on top of their Youth Allowance payment, for a 25 hour week. I worry that this could lead to young people being used as a source of cheap labour.
I also recommend that the young participants be paid award wages for any hours worked above 30 hours. The Governments Path program makes no recommendations for the payment of overtime.
One of the cornerstones of my concept is that I also recommend reaching out to young people in the immediate period after they ‘finish’ their secondary education. This is critical. The Governments Transition to Work concept suggests reaching out after the young person has been disengaged for three to six months or more, despite having already identified the pitfalls and long term ramifications of longer term disengagement.
I’ve also made recommendations in regard to ‘churning’, and outlined possible restrictions on the number of mentorships each business can undertake per year, based on the size of the business and the number of regular employees it has. The Governments Path program is unclear on churning.
If we’re going to do this thing, I say let’s give it all we’ve got. I’d like to challenge the Federal Government to adopt all my measures, and not just pick out the easy parts or the parts they estimate will cost the least to implement. Despite the shortfalls of secondary education, we’re still turning out extremely large numbers of well informed, work and further-study ready young people. The problem is that for too many young people we’re not continuing our engagement with them, and instead letting them fall into disrepair and neglect, mostly because we don’t have a ready-made instrument with which to continue our engagement with them. I’m convinced that this is a preventable situation. Of course I understand that there are lots of kids who won’t be ready for a program such as this, but then, there are already systems in place to deal with those young people with multiple barriers. I think that by focusing almost all our attention on those with the most significant barriers we’re also letting too many kids that are on the cusp of work or study readiness ‘accidentally’ slip into disengagement, while at the same time not offering those young people with multiple barriers something they can aspire to.
Dennis Bills
dennis@life-skills.com.au
www.life-skills.com.au
https://www.facebook.com/transitionaleducation