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Publication Open Access Towards a New Zealand system of skill ecosystems(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2012-09) Dalziel, Paul C.This final report from the ‘Employer-Led Channels’ theme of the Education Employment Linkages research programme addresses how to help young people make effective education employment linkages, focussing on institutions that use direct contact with employers to channel information to young people in secondary school or in further education or training. The report develops stylised models of employers and employees and integrates the two models to produce a model of a ‘skill ecosystem’. It discusses a case study involving the Careers, Internships and Employment centre at the University of Canterbury, using the soft systems approach. A ‘rich picture’ shows the heart of their work to be an integrated set of menus of services provided to employers, students and faculties. The report proposes a New Zealand system of regional skill ecosystems anchored by Careers New Zealand. It further recommends that careers offices in secondary and tertiary education organisations (or the tutors performing that role in a small private training establishment) be regarded as key actors in the regional skill ecosystem. A very important step in this direction has been the recent development by Careers New Zealand of Career Education Benchmarks for secondary schools and for tertiary education organisations.Publication Open Access Towards a learning identity: early school leavers becoming learners(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2012-09-30) Higgins, Jane F.This report presents findings from research with fifty-one Christchurch young people who left school with low or no qualifications. Most of these young people experienced a period when they were not in education, employment or training (known as NEET) but at the time of this research they were all in a learning environment of some kind. The report explores the ways in which many of these young people rejected their former NEET identities and were building learning identities for themselves. It examines what facilitates this process and the processes by which these young people make education employment linkages. The report concludes that some current policy directions risk excluding members of this group from assistance.Publication Open Access Learning to fly: Career management competencies in the school subject classroom(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2012-07-01) Vaughan, K; Spiller, LThis report is concerned with the key transition support system of school-based career education. We argue that long-standing deficiencies in career education require a new framework to address young people’s needs. We discuss exploratory research with two schools on how career management competencies can be put into practice to provide this new framework. We suggest that career management competencies have the potential to be a transformative “core service” in career education. They can re-invigorate the direction of schools and sharpen the focus for the New Zealand Curriculum principles and vision of young people becoming confident, connected, actively involved lifelong learners.Publication Open Access ‘It is all about feeling the aroha’: successful Māori and Pasifika providers(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2010-07-01) Phillips, Hazel; Mitchell, Moana E.It‟s all about feeling the aroha”: Successful Māori and Pasifika providers reports on 15 key informant interviews with Māori and Pacific post school training providers. These key informant interviews were designed to provide insight as to why the current education employment system is operating as it is in Māori and Pasifika communities. Positioned as a kaupapa Māori research project the focus was on highlighting successful education and training initiatives arising out of Māori and Pasifika communities. Historical and contemporary cultural, social and policy contexts impact on these organisations ability to fulfil the aspirations and visions they have for their young people and their whānau, and the communities within which they operate. The PTEs embedded cultural knowledge, values and practices in to their programmes and services to provide holistic support to fulfil the learning, training and cultural needs of their young people. The organisations that participated in this research spent considerable time talking about the increasing challenges they faced in delivering their services and consequently their ability to make sustainable changes to the lived realities of their young people. Despite the moving ground of the policy environment, diminishing funding opportunities and rising social alienation of young people and their communities, the organisations continue to deliver creative and innovative community programmes so that their young people can flourish. In doing so they talk back to government agencies and the standard story of Māori underachievement and talk forward to reflect and uphold the visions of their young people and communities.Publication Open Access Career education networks and communities of practice: a report from the school–communities strand of the education employment linkages project(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2010-07-01) Vaughan, Karen; O'Neil, PaulSchool-based careers advisors have been given a key role in assisting young people in transition from school to work and further education. Their role is especially significant in light of the strategic importance attached to career development for workforce preparation and development policies. However major changes in the nature of work and in contemporary transitions from school, as well as shifts in career education theory and delivery, mean that careers advisors are often left playing continual ―catch up‖ challenge in terms of knowledge and expertise. Meeting the needs of young people today now involves establishing a far wider range of working relationships inside and outside of the school and managing far larger volumes of constantly changing information than ever before. Some careers advisors have addressed these challenges by working closely with the School Support Services pathways advisors to form dynamic, cross-linking, networks alongside and outside of existing organisational structures. These decentralised networks include careers practitioner associations and policy developers and crucially also include a range of people formerly considered peripheral to career education - industry consultants, school support staff, and community coordinators. Far from being a simple personal engagement, the activity of networking on an informal face-to-face and virtual basis is a source of shared learning, knowledge production, and knowledge management. It allows a community of practice to be built across schools, education sectors, and community organisations (including employers and industry) on a regional and national basis. This inclusion of new community membership helps shape the ongoing development of career education. However it also signals a thorny issue around the role of nonteaching support staff in career education models that are moving towards curriculum-based, teacher-qualified activity and delivery. We suggest that the selection and training of careers staff needs to take account of new network and community membership and to enhance individuals‘ capacity to engage in networking. We also suggest that networks and networking be recognised and valued as a professional activity. Networks can be further developed as communities of practice, perhaps with the assistance of a "professional spine" to give cohesion to what is a diffuse set of ideas, activities, and actors in a very dynamic environment.Publication Open Access Education employment linkages: perspectives from employer-led channels(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2010-07-01) Dalziel, Paul C.This report presents results from a series of key informant interviews carried out in 2009 about employer-led channels for helping young New Zealanders make effective educationemployment linkages during their transition years. Employers have become more connected to education institutions, motivated in part by serious skills shortages that emerged over the last decade. Career Services is recognised as a superb source of reliable career information, advice and guidance, whose services could be more widely used. The interviews revealed a concern that large numbers of young New Zealanders undervalue the positive benefits that can be achieved with good quality career guidance. There was wide support for further development of careers education in secondary and in tertiary education institutions. Another theme concerned finding ways to better manage relationships between educators and employers, including the greater use of specialist brokers. Finally, participants emphasised again and again the importance of supporting effective systems for helping young people to imagine different possibilities for their career development, and for helping them to develop skills for exploring and assessing a full range of opportunities as they construct their own career pathways.Publication Open Access Education employment linkages: objective two key informant interviews in regional communities(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2010-07-01) Higgins, Jane F.This report documents findings from the Key Informant stage of Objective 2 (Regional Communities) of the Education Employment Linkages research project. In the last quarter of 2009, interviews were conducted with service providers involved in helping young people with few or no qualifications with their post-school transition to tertiary education/training or employment. Those interviewed included providers of education/training (particularly in Private Training Establishments) and of connections services (involved in tracking and referral). Interviews focused on how providers assisted young people with few or no school qualifications to develop vocational imagination and labour market literacy, and how they facilitated linkages between education/training and employment. Three key concerns emerged from the provider perspective: (i) the difficulty of addressing the diverse and interconnected needs of young people in transition when funding is fragmented and siloed ; (ii) the question of whether success is best measured by means of hard outcomes or according to progress towards achievement; (iii) the place, in the wider education sector, of these providers and the young people with whom they are working.Publication Open Access A matter of perspective : mapping education employment linkages in Aotearoa New Zealand(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2009-07-01) Vaughan, K.; Phillips, Hazel; Dalziel, Paul C.; Higgins, Jane F.This report is the third in the Education Employment Linkages (EEL) Research Report series. Acknowledging that all map-making involves particular perspectives and representations of the world, each of the main chapters documents an important dimension of systems involved in young people’s transition from school. The School-Communities chapter provides an education perspective focused on the perceptions, activities, and key relationships which characterise career education’s preoccupation with information-based, rather than lifelong development work. The Regional Communities chapter provides a sociological perspective that focuses on Youth Training and Training Opportunities providers supporting young people who have left school with few or no qualifications and the trend to more systematic form of provision. The Māori and Pasifika Communities chapter provides an indigenous studies perspective focused on Māori and Pacific education and health providers whose links into the transition system may not be formal but rather accountable directly to Māori and Pasifika communities. The Employer-Led Channels chapter provides an economic perspective focused on Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics’ engagement with employers and the relationship with young people’s ability to make good matches between education and employment options.Publication Open Access Education employment linkages: international literature review(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2008-07-01) Higgins, Jane F.; Vaughan, K.; Phillips, Hazel; Dalziel, Paul C.This report is the second in the Education Employment Linkages Research Report series. Its purpose is to document what is already known in the international literature, drawing on the research team’s respective backgrounds in education, sociology, indigenous studies and economics to begin a trans-disciplinary account of key issues for young people making education and employment choices in their transition years from school to work. The report focuses on five themes in the literature: choice in education-employment linkages; crafting identities; discovery and development of abilities; opportunities and structure; and systems linking education and employment choices.Publication Open Access Education employment linkages: an introduction to the research programme(Lincoln University. Agribusiness and Economics Research Unit, 2008) Dalziel, Paul C.; Higgins, Jane F.; Vaughan, K.; Phillips, HazelIn March 2007, the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology in New Zealand announced that it was providing $2 million of funding for a 5 year research programme on successful education employment matching for youth. This paper describes the structure of the research programme, introduces the research team and explains the ways in which the programme is incorporating Māori research and innovation. The overall aim of the research programme is to answer the question: How can formal support systems best help young New Zealanders make good education employment linkages to benefit themselves, their communities, and the national economy?