We get asked a lot of questions about vocational education and training (VET) in our role as a Jobs and Skills Council and our work with industry, training providers and government to improve skills and training. Listed below are some of the more common questions. Please feel free to contact us if you have any others.
Getting involved & having your say
About JSCs & Skills Insight
Other parts of the skills system
About training packages & the process to update them
Training packages are a collection of documents that describe the skills required to perform certain job roles. The documents that make up a training package, referred to as ‘training products’, include units of competency and their related assessment requirements, qualifications, skill sets, credit arrangements and Companion Volumes.
Training packages are used by registered training organisations and industry as a framework for developing training. They are industry’s way of telling trainers what skills and knowledge students need to perform particular job roles and to what standard. The advantage of training packages is that they offer a national and industry-led approach to training and assessment, giving workers access to skills standards that are recognised across Australia. You can view these at training.gov.au.
Qualifications support job roles within industry. They outline groupings of units of competency to complete to gain competency to take on a given job role. Qualifications within the Australian VET system are available from Certificates I, II, III and IV, to Diploma, Advanced Diploma, Graduate Certificate and Graduate Diploma.
Units of competency are the building blocks of qualifications. They consist of two parts – the unit of competency which defines the skills and knowledge required for effective performance in a discrete area of work, work function, activity or process, and the assessment requirements which specify the evidence and required conditions for assessment.
Skill sets are combinations of units that cover skills required for specialist industry needs (which sometimes can link to a licence or regulatory requirement).
Registered training organisations (RTOs) use training packages to design their curriculum or training programs. Training packages do not prescribe how an individual should be trained.
RTOs are responsible for assessing whether an individual meets the skills standards specified by industry and described in a unit of competency and its assessment requirements.
RTOs are required to adhere to the Standards for Registered Training Organisations (RTOs) 2015 to formally deliver training packages and generate testamurs to students.
The need to update or develop a training package emerges out of stakeholder feedback and research into the skills needs of the industries we work with. This information is used to inform our Workforce Plan of which an activity submission is developed and submitted to the Department of Employment and Workforce Relations (DEWR) who consider and approve the projects to go ahead.
Each training package project Skills Insight undertakes progresses through five stages:
Each stage involves thorough consultation with employers, employees, registered training organisations (RTOs), State and Territory Training Authorities (STAs), government, unions and Industry Training Advisory Bodies (ITABs), and other interested and impacted stakeholders.
Click across the tabs to view active and completed project stages. Consultation takes place at every stage of the project.
Skills Insight is a not-for-profit, government funded, industry-led organisation and one of ten Jobs and Skills Councils. Our role is to collaborate with stakeholders across industry and the skills system to improve skills and training for the agribusiness, fibre, furnishing, food, animal and environment care industries. We have a responsibility to make sure training products are current, compliant with the Standards for Training Packages, and fit for purpose.
With approval from the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR), Skills Insight undertakes projects to understand skills needs, challenges, and potential solutions and deliver outcomes based on these findings. We openly and accurately evaluate and report on these outcomes to guide future decision making.
Read more about Our Role.
Changes to qualifications, skills sets & units
A unit is deleted when the skills, knowledge and/or tasks it describes, are determined to be no longer applicable by those training and working in the industry. If a unit has had low or no enrolments in recent years, it will be investigated as to whether the unit should be deleted. If stakeholders determine that the process or job task described is no longer relevant, the unit will be proposed for deletion. Occasionally a unit can be deleted because it duplicates the skills and knowledge covered by another unit.
A unit may be proposed for deletion as part of an approved project. If stakeholders indicate that the skills, knowledge or job task described within the unit are no longer relevant, and the Assurance Body and Skills Ministers support this view, it will be removed from the qualification/s.
A unit cannot be classified as deleted without being removed from every qualification and/or skill set it is listed in, within its host training package. For example: a unit beginning with the code SFI would only be considered deleted when the unit has been removed from all qualifications and skill sets in the SFI Seafood Training Package.
If a unit is listed in qualifications or skill sets used by multiple sectors across a host training package, all sectors that use the unit should be consulted as part of other training package projects, especially if that unit appears in the core of a qualification. This happens on a case by case basis. If the unit is no longer relevant to those sector areas, the unit will be removed from those qualifications and/or skill sets as well. However, if a unit is still considered required by a sector in the host training package, the unit will remain in the relevant qualifications. It would not be considered “deleted” but would be removed from the qualifications where it was no longer needed.
If a unit is deleted from its host training package, any other training packages that use the unit will need to undergo their own reviews to determine suitable actions to remove the deleted unit. As Skills Insight is only responsible for the review of certain training packages, it is not always within our scope to consult about every qualification a unit is listed in, as these are the responsibility of other JSCs. However, part of our role includes collaboration with other JSCs and we will engage with them as needed, and notify the relevant JSC where our work with training products impacts industries within their remit.
If a qualification or unit is superseded it has undergone major change and this is a clear indication that industry needs have changed and the previous qualification or unit is no longer the most suitable for training delivery.
The Australian Skills Quality Authority has recently updated its Users’ Guide to Standards for RTOs 2015 so that when a unit is superseded an RTO may choose to use the most recent version of the unit rather than the version specified within a qualification or skill set. This rule applies even when the unit is in the core or a specialisation of a qualification and applies whether the replacement unit is equivalent or not equivalent.
See also: What is a minor update to a qualification or unit? What is a major update to a qualification or unit?
Minor changes to units of competency and qualifications include:
In addition, the following changes to existing qualifications would also be considered minor:
Major changes to existing units of competency include:
Major changes to existing qualifications include:
A unit may appear across several qualifications, and these qualifications can be across several industry training packages. When a unit is superseded all qualifications that include the unit will need to be updated, but the timing of when this occurs may be different for each qualification. To update a qualification, a new version of the whole training package must be created, so often changes are strategically bundled together to reduce the number of updates to training packages within a short space of time. Every time there is a change to a qualification the RTOs delivering it need to spend considerable resources to transition to the new standards. We keep this in mind when planning updates.
Updating superseded units within a qualification happens on a case by case basis, following key considerations:
- Whether the unit is listed as a core or elective in a qualification: this will determine whether updating the unit in the qualification would result in a major (core) or minor (elective) change. Other changes which are considered major can include if the unit is not considered equivalent to the one it is superseding and it appears in a specialisation within the qualification.
- Whether a project is already underway to update qualifications and units within the training package: this would allow the changes to be made with minimal impact to the training package.
If the change to the qualification is considered minor and there is a project underway in that training package, the unit will usually be updated. If there is no project underway, it is likely the qualifications would not be updated right away, even if the change is minor, as making the changes will create a new version of the training package.
If the change to the qualification is considered major, further consideration will be given to the best time to update that qualification. If the training package is already being updated, the superseded unit might be added to the update, especially if it is the only change being made to the qualification. Other times it will be held off for when the qualification is being reviewed in full, so that all of the units within the qualification and their learning outcomes can be considered together. The original unit is still able to be taught until such time as the qualification is updated (See the Standards for RTOs 2015 Clauses 1.26 and 1.27 for more information. You may also like to read the User Guide to the Standards on the ASQA website).
The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations has developed a Training Package Products Development and Endorsement Process Policy (TPPDEPP) which outlines the timeframe for developing training package products such as qualifications. While each JSC may have their own way of managing the process, they are obliged to adhere to this framework. The below infographic provides a summary of the information included in the policy.
You can read more about this process by downloading the Training Package Products Development and Endorsement Process Policy (TPPDEPP).
Following approval, the revised or new training package products are published by the JSC on the National Training Register, training.gov.au.
The qualification, skill set or unit is now available for use, but registered training organisations (RTOs) will need time to prepare to deliver them. It can take up to 18 months from the time of publication on training.gov.au for an RTO to be ready to teach the updated or new skill standards.
If the units, skill sets and/or qualifications are on scope for an RTO and have had either minor or major updates deemed as equivalent, they will be automatically put on scope. When units, skill sets and qualifications are either new or updated and deemed not equivalent, RTOs will have to apply to put these components on their scope. However, each RTO also considers their return on investment: i.e. what is the overall cost of development and delivery versus enrolment earning potential? If it is deemed financially viable, the RTO will most likely develop the appropriate training and assessment materials and apply for the components to be put onto their scope.
The Victorian Department of Education and Training (DET) also needs time to update the Victorian Purchasing Guide for the training package, which provides nominal hours for units of competency and maximum payable hours for qualifications.
Skills Insight works with stakeholders so that we can develop units, skill sets and qualifications or other training products that describe how job tasks and roles are performed. Ultimately the nature of the work itself and the stakeholders we interact with inform what goes into a unit, skill set or qualification or other training product, but there are many mechanisms and phases of consultation along the way to confirm that what the documents describe matches real industry skills needs. TAFEs and other registered training organisations (RTOs) then design their training programs based off the units, skill sets and qualifications.
The work to update or develop units, skill sets and qualifications or other training product is carried out as part of a national project. Key stakeholders with relevant experience are identified and contacted to help develop each draft qualification, skill set, unit or other training product. Broader public consultation then takes place so that all interested parties are able to contribute. Stakeholders at either of these stages can include people with experience working or training in the industry, or from associations, unions, registered training organisations (RTOs) and Government and state/territory departments.
Once the final drafts have been developed Assurance Body, and State and Territory Skills Ministers are also given the chance to raise any issues, with project stakeholders consulted again if required.
If you want to be involved in this work, you are encouraged to do so. All you need is knowledge relevant to the job role or skilled activities described in a particular qualification, skill set or unit and a willingness to share your views with us.
Delivering updated qualifications, skill sets or units
Contact us
Our team have a wealth of knowledge and experience working in the VET sector and are happy to answer any queries you have. Not sure who to ask? Email [email protected] or call 03 9321 3526 and we will do our best to address your query.