The context for the future development of work based learning in Australia

The context for the future development of work based learning in Australia

 Abstract

This paper forms part of an ongoing work based project, which is employing elements of action research and action learning, to further develop work based learning in Australia. For the purposes of this paper, workplace learning is the learning that occurs [on a day to day basis] in, at and through the normal course of work. The extent of learning that occurs at work is contingent, and extensive research has been and is occurring into workplace learning.  Work based learning is a particular type of workplace learning – it is learning that is part of a formal program of study that involves the worker (student), their workplace and a higher education service provider (such as a university).  

The authors of this paper have predominantly been involved in business for most of their careers. In recent years the authors have been engaged on both sides of work based learning in Australia; each has been involved, as a supervisor of students and one has been involved as a student. During this time, the authors have been seeking to better understand the reasons for interest in this approach to university education.

Our investigations and learnings have led us to the view that there are three key drivers for work based learning development in Australia – personal agency, organisational capital and university reform. What is very unclear is whether Australian universities will respond to these drivers or whether they will allow non Australian universities to develop this as an alternative pathway for university level education in Australia. This article reviews these drivers   and the authors suggest a likely pathway for the development of work based learning (as a university level education service) in Australia, in the short to medium term.

Introduction

The contemporary position is that the ‘workplace is a critically important site for learning and for access to learning’ (Evans, Guile & Harris, 2011: 153). Billett (2011: 60) posits that:

…what constitutes work is negotiated between institutional facts (Seale 1995) and other social forms (Valsiner 1998) that constitute the social experience (Harre 1995) on the one hand and individuals ‘cognitive experience’ on the other.

Further, Illeris (2004: 434) contends that:

…learning only occurs when both the acquisition processes [through inner psychological processes] and the interplay processes [through the social interaction between the individual and his or her environment] occur.

These perspectives underpin the preliminary learnings from this work based project, which has been underway for some five years and is still in train.

Our learnings, thus far from this project, lead us to the view that work and learning  constitute a confluence and that confluence involves (1) the individual (and their characteristics) (2) their workplace (and its particular characteristics) (3) the individual’s background, experience and training and (4) what the individual is responsible for at work and how they approach their work. In practice we see a considerable  blurring between ‘what is work’ and ‘what is learning’ and this is consistent with Barnett’s projection (in Sawchuk, 2011: 176) that ‘work has to become learning and learning has to become work’.

These perspectives support a view that putting learning and work together creates the opportunity for something more, not less. This is contrary to the historical position of higher education services in Australia (Goozee 2001), which has tended to rate work based learning as not being as high a level of learning as learning in a lecture theatre. Engestrom (2011) has suggested that expansive learning (which is the type of learning that often occurs at work) is required to deal with issues, situations and problems that have not been solved before. This is particularly relevant in knowledge-based businesses (not just trades and lower level jobs). It is becoming clearer that in many circumstances, there is no particular advantage gained in the quality of learning achieved by being in the classroom (irrespective of whether the classroom is real or virtual) - as opposed to being at work. If a workplace provides scope for a student/worker to learn and that student/worker is interested in learning (about the sorts of issues and problems that need to be resolved at work) then, it is probably a decided advantage (over classroom/lecturer hall style learning) to convert this workplace learning into learning that can be formally assessed and acknowledged through a work based learning degree.

The authors of this paper have predominantly been involved in business activities (and not in teaching or research] for most of their careers. In recent years the authors have been engaged on both sides of work based learning in Australia; each has been involved as a supervisor of students and one has been involved as a student. During this time, the authors have been seeking to better understand the reasons for interest in this approach to university education. In essence this article is a report on a work based learning project undertaken by like-minded colleagues seeking to establish work based learning in Australia. This is occurring at a time when  there is almost no incentive or wider interest within Australian universities to seriously engage with work based learning. The project has involved  the delivery of different work based learning programs by one Australian based university and one UK based university covering both undergraduate and post graduate programs. The authors have been on a learning journey to initially understand and then deliver work based learning and have engaged with more than 100 students during that time.

A Confluence of Personal Agency, Organisational Capital and Education Reform

For the purposes of this paper, workplace learning is the learning that occurs (on a day to day basis) in, at and through the normal course of work. The extent of learning that occurs is contingent  on a number factors, noted above.  Work based learning is a particular type of workplace learning – it is learning that is part of a formal program of study that involves the worker (student), their workplace and a higher education service provider (such as a university). That this confluence of work and learning is increasingly becoming an important site for developments such as work based learning appears to be the result of three main streams of influence. One is ‘the central role and significance of the self and personal agency’ in an individual’s career and working life (Billett, 2011: 60). Two is the growth, globally, in organisational intellectual property (Peach, 2005) (and the related emergence of organisational capital (Garnett, 2009)) that is bearing heavily on business performance and results. Three involves efforts by higher education institutions and governments to build workforce skill levels through greater participation in tertiary education (Fuller & Unwin, 2011).

Figure One below illustrates the confluence of these streams - one, two and three. It shows their confluence occurring at the site of workgroups or business units within organisations (not in lecture theatres at universities). The streams (of influence) arise from the three sources noted above and for ease of reference the streams are called:

The Learning stream, as it relates to individuals’ careers and personal/professional development

The Work stream, that incorporates issues of organisational capital and intellectual property, and

The Tertiary Education (university) stream, as it modifies education services in response to government and community needs and wants.

There are a range of ‘tributaries’ (to continue the stream analogy) dotted along each stream, which are feeding the size and the strength of each stream and the resulting confluence.

These tributaries are important points of reference in discussing the factors influencing the development of work based learning. Our experience suggests that, arising from the confluence of these three streams, there is an anticipated improvement in a range of economic and social benefits for the business and broader community. It appears very apparent from the students we have engaged with, that they would be very unlikely to pursue further studies and formalise their qualifications if the work based learning pathway for learning was not available to them. Without work based learning it appears that individuals, workplaces and the economy more generally, would not gain the benefit  from the increase in knowledge and skills achieved by these students during their work based programs. As well, it appears that there are some doubts as to whether the traditional modes of delivery offered by universities will actually be able to keep pace with the increasing, future demand for more qualified workers (deWeert, 2011; Norton, 2013). Work based learning could make a material difference towards  Australia achieving its ever increasing target for graduate qualified workers.

Figure One: The confluence of the three streams influencing workbased learning in Australia.

It is considered that each of the ‘dots’ along each stream are important contributors to the strength of that stream. We have identified these contributors through engaging with students undertaking work based learning and through engagement with workplace supervisors and business owners whose staff have been undertaking a work based learning program. It is noteworthy that only a single point of confluence of the three streams is depicted, with the descriptor ‘Business Unit Performance and Capability’. This was decided on the basis that whilst there are clearly opportunities for interactions across these streams, at different points, the primary, ongoing point of interaction during a student’s degree program (in our experience) has been at this ‘business unit’ level.

Generally, our experience is that a student’s work based learning contract is with the direct head of their section, unit or division. Further, generally our experience has been that project work incorporated within their award, is directly associated with the endeavours of their immediate team. However, we have not taken a formal view in describing this level as ‘business unit’– it is used only as a means of indicating the relevant level where the student is working and undertaking their project work and covers the general area of activity oversighted by their immediate supervisor.  Obviously, whether this confluence is actually a business unit or a section or a division will depend on the particular circumstances of the workplace of each student/worker.

Our investigations have led us to the view that there are strong ‘currents’ moving towards the confluence from the Learning stream and the Work stream.  We have found strong similarities in the motivations of our students, who are generally seeking to maximise the value of what they do on a day-to-day basis and to connect this with the scope to achieve a formal qualification (that enhances recognition and skills transferability). We have also seen a relatively high level of consistency in the strongly positive approach of workplace owners and supervisors to on-job and on-project skills development and enhancement.

We have however, encountered a small but important number of student/workers who are ‘their own bosses’ – generally professional level individuals working in their own practice and seeking to use the opportunity of work based learning to marry their own professional development and the development of their practice; often to expand both the scope and credibility of their business. Whilst they are different from the point of view of workplace structure and relationship, they appear to us to reflect very similar motivations, as found in other workplace settings where there is a clear separation between the student/worker and their work supervisor/boss.

Our assessment is that the Tertiary Education (university) stream is currently much weaker than the other two streams in Australia. This is evidenced by the almost negligible offering of work based learning degrees and the ongoing barriers and difficulties encountered by those seeking to expand the operation, in Australian universities, of much less intensive reforms such as work integrated learning (WIL) (Elmslie, n.d.). Work integrated learning is the provision of a specified number of units/subjects, that involve a work placement, in a traditional degree program. However, as noted above, there is a relatively long history of work based learning within the vocational education sector of tertiary education in Australia (Goozee 2001) but this is not the case in relation to the university sector.  

We surmise that the absence ( in Australia) of a vocational stream that provides professional qualifications through to graduate levels and above ( as is the case in some European jurisdictions (CEDEFOP 2009, 2010 & 2013)), may have contributed to a comparative downgrading of work based learning pathways in Australia. It seems that when you can only gain lower level qualifications by work based learning there is a likelihood that a perception could develop that work based learning must be a lower level of learning.  Against this background, the characteristics of the streams, which are contributing to the current interest and relevance of university level work based learning, are explored more fully below.

The Learning stream

Our experience is that individual workers live in an environment where there are very few ‘jobs for life’ and very few ‘companies for life’. Consequently, there is a strong personal need to be ‘employable’ (which supplants the previous focus on just current ‘employment’) and this requires the development of transferrable skills. And this further brings to light the need for the ‘recognition’ of these acquired, transferable skills: its one thing to have strong experience and a record of performance but it also important to have a simple way of communicating this expertise. The possession of a ‘qualification’ is one significant way of achieving this.  Work based learning is one way of converting workplace learning into a recognised, transferable and credible qualification.

This volatility in the workplace has been explored by Cairns & Malloch (2011: 12-15) and they have identified a number of factors that are contributing to the change in the way in which individuals think about their (work) situation and think about how they need to position themselves for long-term employability. These factors include -

• Rapid changes in job categories, products and services with new ones quickly emerging
• ‘McDonalisation’, homogenisation, corporatisation and the loss of cultural relevance
• Two out of three people may be unemployed in the way that we currently understand it and ‘work nomads’ may become more prevalent - seeking small jobs here and there
• New world order with the emergence of the Tiger economies and the increasing influence of economy, social activity and communication.

Whilst some of these factors will have varying impacts on individuals and their workplaces and whilst we have not encountered all of these factors during our project, factors such as these are causing student/workers to recast the way in which they approach their careers (and therefore the learning and development they are seeking).

Our experience with students over the past five years indicates that a number of students (particularly mature age students) are less inclined to pick a ‘discipline’ to study and become an expert in (e.g. Marketing, Finance, IT, HR etc.). Our understanding, thus far, based on interactions with students during their work based programs, is that this is because (1) classroom ‘subjects’ are often quite removed from the realities worker/students are dealing with (2) so much of what is happening (at work) is trans and multi disciplinary and, as well, (3) so much knowledge is being created outside educational institutions. This combination of factors could be aggregated into what we have started to describe as a ‘professional practice capability’ that student workers are seeking to gain and is what they perceive as being attainable through the work based learning approach. 

It appears that what our project is uncovering in regard to what student’s are looking for through work based learning is not inconsistent with findings in other jurisdictions. Costley (2011: 403) notes, in regard to the (predominantly) UK experience with work based learning that:

It offers students the opportunity to develop themselves further because it is

project-based, grounded in practice and tailored to the requirements of people at work. From current research, based on student interviews, we have found that an important reason why many practitioners select workplace learning is that it offers them a new and challenging transdisciplinary learning opportunity that will develop them further and provide a new challenge.

We contend that the student/worker attraction to this notion of professional practice capability is that it is seen as being sufficiently grounded in the world of work to support content knowledge development but that it also provides (much sought after) access to broader theoretical concepts at the same time as credentialing experiential ways of learning.

Also, this notion of practice capability sits comfortably with other factors (tributaries dotted along the Learning stream) that students are dealing with in their workplace – e.g. individual work and performance evaluation; company based training and development and so on, shown in Figure One above. The combination of these factors has the potential to impact on a student/worker’s long-term personal development and career progression and accords with the overarching significance of ‘personal agency’ in contemporary workplace settings.

Some students we have encountered in work based learning programs have directly connected their personal/professional learning journey with the performance evaluation and appraisal frameworks in their work places. Further, they have developed work based projects with the dual purpose of not only enhancing job/career progression in their workplace but, at the same time, upgrading their formal qualifications through the mechanisms of work based learning. In our experience, it appears that there are strong complementary forces at play between the Learning and Work streams. The next section looks in more detail at the Work stream.

The Work stream

It is recognised that contemporary organisations seeking to be highly competitive need to foster expanded capacity through organisational capital (Garnett, 2009; 2012).  Cathcart (2008) has noted that developing firm capability requires different types of learning strategies and these can be achieved in many different ways. Dealtry (2006: 313) suggests that contemporary organisations require  ‘new management styles, leadership and thinking’ because much of what individual managers have experienced in their earlier working life is no longer relevant. He suggests that:

If managers do not have the necessary understanding to change themselves it is very unlikely that they will be able to contribute effectively to the development of organisational effectiveness through more well directed and purposeful job performance (2006: 314).

Based on these three different perspectives, the work stream constitutes a complex blend of organisational capital, capability, leadership and thinking. Bringing this into operation (in any firm, be it large or small) requires significant focused effort and skill and whilst it provides the foundation for ongoing market success and development, it often requires significant changes inside the firm. 

Dealtry (2006) suggests two models for supporting changes in the business practices that are needed to support the ‘flow’ along the Work stream. One model involves a significant movement in thought, to regard an organisation as a ‘brain’ and to move away from seeing an organisation as a ‘machine’. This accords with the notion that there is less certainty about what needs to happen at work and in many work situations (instead of the older notion of work being a pre determined, routine production process) and that (knowledge) workers are actively engaged in resolving the unfolding work issues for which there are not always simple, pre-existing solutions. Without a ‘brain’ model underpinning the efforts along the Work stream, it is difficult to envisage being able to ‘connect the dots’ between say, company reporting of results, business strategy and organisational capital (as illustrated along the Work stream in Figure One above). Such a model predisposes company management to recognise the importance of contributing to and supporting each individual student/worker’s development along the Learning stream as a part of series of integrated efforts moving towards the delta of the stream.

Dealtry’s second model (illustrated in Table One below) then proposes a layered framework which seeks to illustrate the nature of the capabilities required by workers as they progress and confront different levels of uncertainty in their workplaces. On the left hand side of the table are the different levels of task and situation uncertainty. On the right hand side are possible organisational roles, from line managers at the bottom to directors at the top.   

Table One: Levels of uncertainty associated with different organisational levels    (Adapted from Dealtry (2006: 318))

Levels of task and situation certainty	Organisational Roles/Levels
Unfamiliar tasks in unfamiliar situations	CEO and Director level concerned with policy
Unfamiliar tasks in familiar situations	Senior management team members who are heads of functions
Familiar tasks in unfamiliar situations	Functional specialists who manage particular areas
Familiar tasks in familiar situations	Operational line managers at supervisor and foreman level

From a reading of this table, it appears that, in order to achieve the changes needed to create organisational capabilities that support the development of intellectual and organisational capital, key managers need to become adept at dealing with unfamiliar tasks and unfamiliar situations. Further, if managers progress to higher roles in the organisation they need to regularly deal authoritatively with both types of unfamiliarity, simultaneously. The upper sections of Dealtry’s model appear to be consistent with Engestrom’s conception of expansive learning (2011) and these higher-level roles are about mastery in situations when new knowledge is being uncovered as part of work. Engestrom’s theory of expansive learning moved away from the ‘acquisition’ and ‘participation’ based notions of learning because (1) they  ‘depict learning as primarily a one-way movement from incompetence to competence’ (2011: 86) and (2) they depend on the contents to be learned being well known ahead of time (2011: 87).

It follows that, in expansive learning, you learn something that is not there yet; learners construct a new object and concept for their collective activity and implement this new object and concept in practice (Engestrom, 2011: 87). Engestrom goes on to say:

 When the whole collective activity system, such as work processes and organisations need to redefine themselves, traditional modes of learning are not enough. Nobody knows exactly what needs to be learned.  The design of the new activity (externalisation) and the acquisition of the knowledge and skills it requires (internalisation) are increasingly intertwined. In expansive learning they merge…’(2011: 87).   

Also, Engestrom (2011: 88) sees lean production and the shortening of product life cycles reinforcing the need for expansive learning and cites two further broadly based needs for expansive learning: (1) the emergence and escalation of social production or peer production that use the internet and (2) the appearance of global threats and risks (climate change, new pandemic diseases and global financial disasters).

This opens up knowledge workers to significant challenges in concept formation and practical redesign that is generally likely to exceed the boundaries of any single discipline, profession or organisation. Our experience is that work based learning is highly appropriate in these circumstances because it (a) uses work based projects as the foundation for learning that supports both individual and workplace outcomes and (b) provides an academic supervisor (in addition to ongoing workplace supervision) to enhance and assess the scope and level of learning.

In such settings, where workers are individually and collaboratively working on emergent issues and problems, an important issue for the management of an organisation is to foster the context and setting for this work to proceed, and to establish a way in which this new knowledge will contribute to the intellectual capital of the organization. Garnett (2009: 226-230) has identified the following prescriptions for this to occur:   

1.             Knowledge must have a performative value in relation to the achievement of organizational objectives in order to contribute to the intellectual capital of the organization..........  

2.              For individual knowledge to become organizational knowledge, and thus fully contribute to the intellectual capital of the organization, it must be shared and accepted by others (Eden and Spender 1998:216).

3.              Organizations need structures to facilitate knowledge development and transfer at the level of the individual and the group (Myers 1996:4).

Such prescriptions involve both workers and their organisations working and learning simultaneously. In this way, a strong synthesis needs to be established between the actions along both the Learning and Work streams set out in Figure One above.

The authors observations are that both of these streams require students/workers with a high level of what has been termed, earlier, as professional practice capability. Such capability provides the individual with important practice abilities that will not only put them in good stead during their working life but also enable them to work effectively in organisational settings where the products of work are knowledge based. Further, it appears that this mutual sharing of personal and business objectives is causing the emergence of efforts along the third stream to support this synthesis.

It is also causing those responsible for training and development in organisations to explore more effective/connected ways of providing professional development and learning opportunities for the staff in their organisation. Work based learning appears to be one of the potential ‘more connected’ ways of building this bridge between personal agency and organisational capital. The next section looks at developments along the Tertiary Education (university) stream that are contributing to the provision of graduate degrees (and above) by way of work based learning.

Tertiary education (university) stream

Up until now, Dealtry (2006: 313) suggests that conventional education responses demonstrate a lack of coherence between learning investments, strategic intent and the learning needs of individuals in an organisation. He contends that academic solutions are invariably  (a) not integrated (b) IT focused  (c) discipline-centric and (d) lacking in an appreciation of the overall impact on the student. The authors’ experience during this project supports the view that what has become known as work based learning is one viable mechanism for responding to the shortcomings identified by Dealtry and which can deliver benefits to the worker/learner and their organisation concurrently.  

It is not surprising, given the lack of vocational pathways available to students in Australia seeking a professional degree and above, that the third (university) stream in Figure One above, is much weaker in comparison to the other two streams of influence. For some considerable time developments in work based learning in tertiary education in Australia have been mainly in vocational education with its application to many different trade, certificate and diploma level qualifications (Australian Government, 2013). In fact, it appears that for some considerable time, the appeal and positioning of the university sector in Australia has been based on it not being work based. In the process of establishing universities’ position of pre-eminence in awarding the vast majority of bachelor degrees and above, the implication has been to diminish the value of work based oriented qualifications and for them to be associated with lower level qualifications (Goozee 2001). This appears to be much less of an issue in jurisdictions where both the university and vocational sector have well established pathways for awarding degree level qualifications (CEDEFOP 2009, 2010 & 2013).

To some degree, this type of differentiation in Australia (between vocational and university awards) is being moderated by the impact of labour market demands for work savvy graduates in many professions. The university sector has endeavoured to respond by introducing   a ‘work placement’ element in some existing degree programs. This is often referred to as work integrated learning (WIL) and is a potential way of bringing a small part of the world of work into a degree program   (Innovative Research Universities, 2013). The potential re vitalisation of work based nursing degrees, in Australia, is a further recognition of the benefits in having graduates gain their training and development in a work setting (Phillips, 2007). At the time of writing however, the authors are aware of only one university offering above bachelor level awards that are fully founded on a student’s learning at work (University of Southern Queensland, 2013). At the bachelor level, we are not aware of any full, work based learning programs being offered by Australian universities.

This limited response maybe a hangover from history but there are deeper issues in play. For example, whilst Costley’s analysis (2011), was not directed specifically towards Australia, the factors  identified are considered to be contributing to holding back work based learning’s  development in Australian universities. These factors include that work based learning:

• Is transdisciplinary (Boud and Solomon, 2001 in Costley, 2011),   
• Does not sit well with the structure and procedures of full time (on campus) university modes of study (Garnett, 2007 in Costley, 2011)
• Requires different support and supervision (not consistent with the skill set or mind set of many university academics) (Boud and Costley, 2007 in Costley, 2011)

Whilst these issues are clearly not unique to Australian universities, in other national jurisdictions, government policy intervention has operated as a strong stimulus (to overcome the potential inertia) for work based learning development at universities (Garnett & Workman, 2009). This does not appear to be a likely outcome in Australia, where it appears that government has stepped back from making ‘micro’ changes to university approaches to learning and teaching and are putting a policy focus on creating an active and viable ‘market’ for higher education services. In this way, the government is signalling that it will be up to the ‘market’ to drive changes in what is offered and how it is offered.

Under this scenario it seems most likely that -

• Traditional academic resistance will continue to inhibit recognition and development of truly flexible approaches to learning and teaching, such as work based learning
• New, private and international providers (already experienced in the field) are most likely to fill the market demand for more flexible approaches.

In addition, it appears that there is just sufficient momentum (through approaches such as work integrated learning) to respond to the community and the market with just sufficient action to avoid significant change to the current discipline oriented approach to most university degree offerings. It is noteworthy that the Grattan Institute’s Report (Norton, 2013: 9 & 21) on higher education in Australia notes that ‘Australia‘s higher education system is not in crisis’ and that ‘the biggest story in higher education during 2012 was the rise of MOOCs‘—massive open online courses’. It could be that the sector’s interest in MOOCs is consistent with Dealtry’s analysis (noted above) in that it is a continuation of the universities’ pre occupation with IT mechanisms for delivering content and further evidence of a lack of integration and engagement with the context for learning.  

At the same time the report notes that ‘For some occupations, skills shortages exist alongside a pool of relevantly-qualified graduates struggling to find full-time work’ and that ‘ around a quarter of employers reported that they would have recruited more graduates had a larger number of better candidates been available’ (Norton, 2013: 77). This reiterates issues noted by both Dealtry (2006) and Costley (2011) about the barriers to universities engaging more deeply and more widely with a genuine commitment to work based learning. Consequently, work to establish trans-disciplinary, problem centric, work-based pathways for higher levels of learning and development appear to be unlikely under present policy settings. Work based learning is therefore likely to remain a relatively weak stream as far as existing public Australian universities are concerned. What is uncertain is the extent to which new, private or international providers are able to expand this stream.

Summary

Work based learning is a potential additional pathway available to individuals and workplaces to develop the capability necessary to deal with the emergent context for work and learning in Australia. There appears to be strong forces at play that are compelling individual workers to build their ‘CV’, as it provides them with a higher degree of certainty and control over their employability. This is important because there is little prospect of secure employment in a single firm and a single occupation into the future (Cairns & Malloch, 2011).

Similarly, strong forces are driving organisations to build intellectual property and to expand their organisational capital to be competitive in the knowledge driven economy of contemporary business (Peach, 2005; Garnett, 2009). Firms currently employ many approaches to work place learning, including - on-site supervision, on-site classroom training, off-site training and development programs (including  formal education mechanisms) and a wide variety of customised mentoring and networking programs. These comprise the ‘menu’ of opportunities, available to organisations, to respond to the convergence of the learning stream and work streams illustrated in Figure One above. Cathcart (2008) suggests that a major challenge faced by many firms is choosing which organisational learning strategy or group of strategies would be the most appropriate to build strategic capability for competitive advantage, especially when workplaces are so diverse and in a continual state of change.  At this stage in Australia, few individual learners and workplace owners or supervisors are fully aware of the extent that work based learning would be able to complement their respective, and mutual, development.

Through the ongoing project being undertaken by the authors, into the development of work based learning in Australia, we have observed that students are seeking to develop a ‘professional practice capability’ that will contribute to their ongoing personal and professional development. At the same time, firms are seeking to build capability to respond to the emergent needs of the marketplace and part of this involves growing both organisational and intellectual capital. To do this, firms need workers who are capable of dealing with both situational and task uncertainty and who are able to build new knowledge products.

Even so, the authors forecast that it will most likely take some time for Australia’s public universities to develop and expand work based learning. This is due to a significant number of existing, internal barriers (within universities) to this approach  and this is further compounded by national, education policy settings that are unlikely to prescribe particular pathways for responding to labour market needs.  Consequently, the authors suggest that it may well be new, private and international universities (already skilled in this area) that respond effectively to the demand, for higher level qualifications, arising from the convergence of the ‘Learning’ and ‘Work’ streams in Australia.  

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