Qualifications Frameworks in Australia

From old to new: the Australian qualifications framework

“…The AQF was introduced in 1995 and phased in over five years. Keating (2000) says that a qualifications framework has three broad purposes. It aims to: establish equivalence and links between qualifications in articulation, credit transfer, pathways and 'seamlessness', by ensuring that qualifications are recognised by different jurisdictions and stakeholders; be a mechanism of quality control, encompassing quality assurance, user confidence in the system, and funding; and, achieve coherence between general and vocational streams, the aim of which is to provide a basis for measurement and comparison of outcomes, and to provide the basis for embedding key or core skills.…”

Stating the Obvious: The European Qualifications Framework is Not a neutral evidence-based policy tool

“…all sectors are included within the same framework and with the same underpinning principles (Allais, 2003(Allais, , 2007Keating, 2003;Strathdee, 2003). Ensor (2003) and Young (2007) both point to the difference in epistemological concerns between the two sectors, and in many countries (for example, South Africa, New Zealand and Scotland) there has been resistance from the university sector against what is perceived as a 'new vocationalism' -i.e.…”

“…The South African evaluation was, for example, contested for only evaluating the implementation process and not looking into the policy of the qualifications framework itself. Other articles deal more or less critically with national frameworks and processes of implementation (Bouder, 2003;Keating, 2003;Lauzackas & Tütlys, 2007Keevy, 2008), ideological features of qualifications frameworks (Allais, 2003(Allais, , 2007, and problems of unitisation/modularisation as a key feature of a national qualifications framework (Raffe et al, 2002). Michael Young (2003Young ( , 2005Young ( , 2007) is one of the few who have attempted to theorise or draw up typologies for frameworks.…”

The impact of National Qualifications Frameworks: by which yardstick do we measure dreams?

“…The way NQFs use specific terms also differs. For example, the use of 'vertical' and 'horizontal' can refer to types of qualifications (Bouder 2003;Keating 2003), to comparison between them (Marock 2011), to partnerships between industry and education (Hozjan 2008), or to mobility of workers (Paulsen 2008). Furthermore, some NQFs could espouse to be one type, yet in reality be a different type: even NQFs which claim to be 'simplistic' are often 'complex' as their "qualifications specify the curriculum in a great deal of detail, while claiming not to" (Allais 2003, 313).…”

“…Some research outlines theoretical perspectives to research NQFs (e.g. Fernie and Pilcher 2009) or talks of the 'success' (Young 2003;Raffe 2003), 'failure' (Allais 2007a;Keating 2003) or limited 'impact' of NQF (Fernie et al 2013). There are ostensibly many reasons why the 'impact' of NQFs is researched.…”