The Government has confirmed it will be merging 16 polytechnics around the country into one national entity in one of the biggest training shakeups in decades.
Thousands of trade apprentices, including those in the heavy diesel and automotive sector, will be impacted by the radical changes, and not everyone is on board with the plan.
The polytechnics will merge into a national entity called the New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology to administer all students, apprentices and industry trainees.
Education minister Chris Hipkins says the institute would take over responsibility for workplace training and apprenticeships from industry training organisations over the next two or three years.
The Industry Training Organisations (ITOs) would be replaced by up to seven workforce development councils that would be set up by 2022 to influence vocational education and training.
Under this structure, the national institution would take over 145,000 apprentices and trainees and 25,000 employers, plus the existing 110,000 polytechnic enrolments.
It follows a period of crisis for the training sector where the Government has spent $100 million in extra funding for four struggling polytechnics over the past year.
Hipkins says the previous model was “broken” and it was time to “reset the whole system and fundamentally rethink the way we view vocational education and training, and how it’s delivered”.
“Vocational education, trades training and on the-job training have been allowed to drift for too long.
These are long-term challenges that this government is committed to fixing.
“The comprehensive changes we are making will address the widespread skills shortages across most industry sectors.
These shortages highlight the limitations of the current vocational educational system,” Hipkins says.
“Repeated forecasts show that one third of all jobs in New Zealand are likely to be significantly affected by automation, and by as early as 2022 more than half of all employees will require significant upskilling and retraining.
“As lower-skilled jobs disappear we need our people to learn new skills, often while on the job, earning while they are learning.
Furthermore, advances in automation and artificial intelligence mean it won’t just be lower-skilled workers affected.
“We also know the regions are increasingly struggling to find enough skilled people to keep their economies strong.
Too many Maori, Pacific and disabled learners are being left behind to achieve at a lower level because the system just won’t respond to their needs.
“New Zealand needs to lift productivity and for that to happen we need morecompanies to be involved in training and taking on more apprentices.
“Currently however, nearly nine out of 10 of our businesses are not training through industry training.
Yet at the same time, 71% of employers surveyed say there is, or will soon be, a skills shortage in their industry area,” Hipkins says.
Changes ‘have been rushed’ The Motor Industry Association says it’s concerned that industry and employers will lose influence over vocational training because of the overhaul.
Chief executive David Crawford says that the Industry Training Organisation model has been working well
for the automotive sector.
“MITO, the Motor Industry Training Organisation, has been very responsive to the industry’s needs in the design of the range and contents of the courses in the automotive industry as well as in the way it has been able to liaise with the polytechs.
“We are concerned that replacing these specialist ITOs, such as MITO, with much larger and wide-ranging Workforce Development Councils will result in the sector losing an important level of influence over the way in which industry training outcomes are designed.
“The ITOs have been able to be nimble in responding to industry needs, suchas adapting on the ground training to suit new developments and technology.
“The Government’s changes could mean that some of the smaller and more specialists sectors would have difficulty in getting their voices heard against the needs of much bigger industry groups.”
Crawford says he is disappointed that the Government did not listen to the industry when it called for a timely, not rushed, review of ITOs and their effectiveness.
“It appears these changes have been rushed and there is little evidence that the Government has listened to the concerns of this sector when pushing ahead with its reforms.”
End of the road for MITO. MITO is one of the ITOs set to be replaced under the new industry training reforms by the Workforce Development Councils (WDCs).
The management of MITO’s apprentices and learners, including their pastoral care, will transition to the newly formed New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology, which combines the current 16 polytechnics, by December 31, 2022.
The transition arrangements are likely to be phased and it is yet unknown when MITO’s transition will occur.
MITO chief executive Janet Lane says “while it is disappointing that the industry feedback from the proposal consultation hasn’t been taken into consideration, we are pleased that the minister has listened to the call for a carefully managed transition plan and put in place timeframes to help achieve this”.
“We are committed to working with Government and industry to support our learners, employers and secondary schools through the transition to the new vocational education system.”
“The minister has emphasised that it is business as usual and does not want to see a slowdown in enrolments, so we are continuing to promote our training programmes and career pathways to ensure our industries gain new talent and qualified people,” Lane says.
RTF keeps ‘an open mind’ Road Transport Forum chief executive Nick Leggett says there have “been a lot of words in the polytechnic and industry training reform announcements … but not a lot of detail”.
“As an industry with worker shortages, we are all about industry training.
It is hard to see these announcements enhancing the relationship between government, education providers and industry, but we are willing to keep an open mind and we hope to be consulted on how road freight transport can benefit from future vocational education changes.
“We would be keen to seewhere we fit in the Workforce Development Councils, but at the moment, we have more questions than answers,” he says.
The RTF has made a submission on the proposed reforms and it hopes to be included in the conversations government will be having with stakeholders as it puts more detail into the reform.
“Our view was there was strength in the Industry Training Organisation (ITO) model because it was industry-led, industry-governed and therefore, responsive to the needs of industry.
We are hopeful that this is not just the samesystem being re-established under different titles with a state-controlled management structure, as that would not work so well for our industry.
“In the meantime, we are focused on finding industryled solutions and the Road Transport Forum has taken responsibility for future development of the Sector Workforce Engagement Programme (SWEP).
This means we can focus on education and training in the areas most likely to be a source of future employees.
“RTF is also keen to see a formalised cadetship programme developed that has clear parameters and appropriate levels of recognition and opportunities for cadets,” Leggett says.
