Improved employment opportunities for young people in new ways
BSL is driving a national approach to youth unemployment.
Access to decent work is critical for young people to secure a good life. It also advances Australia’s prosperity. However, many young people are struggling to find decent jobs that set them up for the future. Youth unemployment and underemployment continue to be stubbornly high. The pandemic accelerated the rise of national youth unemployment, reaching 16.3% in July 2020 – and even higher in many regions. Source: https://www.abs.gov.au/statist...
The crisis has only intensified the urgency for a targeted youth employment response – a response that tackles the systems which fail to support young people into decent employment.
Our response to youth unemployment is based on an ambitious vision to develop a national approach to youth employment that is led by local communities. We call it the National Youth Employment Body (NYEB) - a coordinated, local to a national approach to youth unemployment in Australia. It enables communities to identify and address barriers to youth unemployment in their area and create local responses.
With funding from our partner, the Paul Ramsay Foundation, the NYEB expanded in this last financial year to six key youth unemployment hotspots across Australia:
- Logan-Beaudesert, QLD
- Shoalhaven, NSW
- Adelaide North SA
- Warrnambool, VIC
- Gold Coast, QLD
- Darwin, NT
An additional bushfire impacted site will be included, bringing the total number of sites to seven.
The Foundation has also invested in BSL’s research and policy capability to demonstrate the impact and outcomes of the NYEB model. This in turn supports the aspiration to help even more young people experiencing disadvantage by further expanding the NYEB model across Australia and supporting advocacy to government to support expansion.
We are very grateful to be working in partnership with the Paul Ramsay Foundation to change the way in which our country approaches youth unemployment.
Equipping young people for employment through better vocational education and training
We’re working to create change in Vocational Education and Training (VET) to support young people into work.
Through our National Youth Employment Body (NYEB), we’re working to strengthen Vocational Education and Training (VET) so that it leads to sustainable entry-level work for young people. This includes understanding the underlying issues that effectively undermine VET provision and improving VET to equip young people with the skills and qualifications demanded by current and future labour markets.
VET completion rates for young people and disadvantaged learners have declined and stagnated - in the years leading into the COVID-19 pandemic, less than 50% completed their training. The pandemic has since made the situation worse by stagnating participation in vocational training. Source: https://ncver.edu.au/news-and-...
Compounding the low VET completion rates is a misalignment between training trends and labour demand. Our learnings through our NYEB initiative demonstrate the importance of bringing local communities, training providers and employers together to make VET more effective in setting young people up for employment. We learned that VET needs reshaping to provide youth with the skills and on-the-job training in occupations that exist in the local community and help them make a smooth transition to working. Particularly in the context of the pandemic and economic disruptions, there was a need to offer skills pathways for young people that enabled rapid entry to work and combined work and ongoing training.
Drawing on data and local expertise, local NYEB Community Investment Committees identified a high demand for care occupations, particularly in aged care and disability care roles. Given this, in mid-2020, we commenced planning for a local community-based skilled employment solution that could be tested with young people and employers to support entry into the aged care and disability sector.
We partnered with the Human Services Skills Organisation to roll out the Entry into Care Skills Trial over the latter part of 2020 and through the first half of 2021.
The trial tested a skilled employment model in several of the regions in which the NYEB operates and rapidly upskilled a ‘surge’ workforce for the aged care and disability support sector during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Some 48 young people from Darwin, Penrith, Logan, the Gold Coast and Adelaide completed the trial, with many confidently moving into employment or further training.
The trial supported communities to design and implement a skills pathway for young people to enter the care sector, with BSL playing an intensive enabling role in joining up partners and connecting local stakeholders to funding opportunities.
Findings from the trial will be used to develop and strengthen the skills pathway for the care sector and adapt the model to other local growth sectors, such as construction and agriculture. Findings may also lead to national vocational education reform.