TAFE South Australia's deep problems in leadership, standards exposed by 2018 report: seven campuses shut
TAFE SA's strong presence with industry courses at the Tonsley Innovation District In Adelaide's southern suburbs.
A damning independent report in 2018 into TAFE (Technical and Further Education) SA, an independent statutory corporation of the state government, criticised poor strategy and leadership that led “four years of lost opportunity”.
TAFE SA, which gave skills training to about 70,000 students – about the same as South Australia’s universities – was hit by a crisis in 2017 when 16 courses were suspended due to repeated failures to meet national standards.
A strategic capability review, by bureaucrat Terry Moran and educational reformer Kim Bannikoff, was scathing and dismayed by the depth of the problems at TAFE SA. Its chairman Peter Vaughan, CEO Robin Murt and most of its private-industry-dominated board departed after what has been revealed as deep problems “from an absence of strategy, poor leadership and the centralisation of decision making and resources”.
An earlier report by the Nous Group found the board had embraced a cost-cutting target set by the Labor state government in its 2015 WorkReady reforms but TAFE had “lost sight of the importance of quality”. Despite the cost cutting, TAFE became less efficient, with fewer qualifications delivered.
A course revamp – including student fees – was be part of a “fresh start” by the new Liberal government in 2018 to overhaul TAFE SA in a vocational education and training (VET) market “based on contestability, access and choice”. Its first state budget invested $109 million over five years to support TAFE but targeted seven TAFE campuses for closure: Tea Tree Gully, Port Adelaide, Urrbrae, Parafield, Wudinna, Roxby Downs and Coober Pedy.
The new government stuck to its predecessor's target of having TAFE SA ready to fully compete with private training providers by the middle of 2019. It was committed to TAFE SA’s role as a quality provider and to providing a rescue package to transform TAFE SA so that it could flourish in the VET market.
In 2021, the South Australian government conceded that TAFE SA had struggled to meet efficiency savings and wouldn't achieve revenue targets. This has led to an extra $215.5 million allocated to it over four years.
State treasurer Rob Lucas said TAFE zSAwas not enrolling enough paying students and had to prepare for changing skills priorities being decided at a national level. TAFE SA was expected to lose 74 full-time-equivalent jobs, reducing to 1,973 positions.
TAFE operating expenditure is expected to grow by 0.6 per cent to $324m. TAFE made a surplus of $8m in 2019-20, but was expected to have recorded a $5m deficit in 2020-21, followed by a $541,000 deficit in 2021-22.
