WITH the new year comes a new school season, and TAFE New England (TNE) director Peter Hielbuth said enrolment has been healthy at the Inverell campus.
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“I had reports yesterday that there was steady interest at Inverell and our other campuses,” he said.
Mr Heilbuth said Inverell was offering a broad suite of courses in areas of business, IT, government, retail operations, community services, aged care, early childhood education and foundation programs for job readiness, literacy and numeracy.
Engineering also looks to be on offer in 2015.
Mr Heilbuth said TNE Connects, a blended teaching approach, would offer an additional 50-60 more courses through TNE Connects.
“In some cases it might be some workshops, it might be online, it might be supported study, it might be some paper based learning,” he said, adding that students were encouraged to use the campus computer labs.
Non-subsidised courses will be run on an as-needed basis, but Mr Hielbuth said there are commercial courses scheduled, often delivered by a mobile unit.
All TAFE campuses are under more pressure with the implementation of Smart and Skilled reforms, narrowing the field for subsidised certificates and a rise in fees for all students. The changes affect not only TAFE, but all public and private registered training organisations across the state.
Mr Heilbuth said TAFE head teachers had been actively engaging with local businesses about the course offerings and how TAFE can best work with those industries.
“The reality of our educational business is that it is vocational educational and training, and if we’re not providing training that provides people with a foot in the door or access into a job, then that’s an issue,” he said.
“So, as a result of that, we obviously have to have good relationships with industry because it’s all about that kind of connection.”