Task Based Competency to Problem Based Capability: An Australian View

Mark WatsonSwinburne University of

TechnologyMelbourne, Victoria, Australia

markwatson@swin.edu.au

ABSTRACTModels of education and training are an ever evolving construct, dealing with inputs from many directions with vested interests in the outcomes.

Design Education is primarily focused on the tertiary area or higher education field yet to get there, students should be able to follow a pathway of integrated education and training.

From compulsory education in the primary and secondary systems to the tertiary and professional development areas of education and training there is a move to reduce duplication. This paper looks at Design Education’s fit within the Australian and International context.

Author KeywordsCompetency; Capability; Problem-based learning; Task based learning; Training; Education.

INTRODUCTIONIn the West we have a saying “like a square peg in a round hole”, meaning that something or someone is not fitting into the niche of his or her society.

One could ask the existential question “is it the hole that is misplaced or the peg”?

Design education has evolved in line with developed society apace with the industrial age since the mid-20th century. Even before this the industrial revolution was playing forward ideas and ideologies embraced by some and demonised by others. One of those ideologies is Competency Based Training.

With Higher Education adopting the paternal ‘top down’ approach, it is interesting that competency based education and training is considered a ‘bottom up’ approach.

In looking at the existential nature of design education we must look to determine which way is up.

Design Education in the Australian Tertiary Education Sector Design as a professional discipline has, since the mid-20th century been an incumbent of Technical Education yet peculiarly placed within the Arts, with Institutes of Technology or Polytechnic Colleges issuing Diplomas and Fellowship Diplomas right up unto the 1990’s.

A shake up of the tertiary education sector saw Technical Colleges promoted to University status, and the technical aspects split between, trade, para-professions and professionals.

A vocational education sector or Technical and Further Education (TAFE) developed to provide training and education to the trade and para-professions issuing Certificate training and Diploma education.

This later evolved as dual sector TAFE Institutes (Further Education / Higher Education) and they developed and delivered Degrees in areas not in direct competition with the Higher Education sector.

The Australian experience is imperfectly framed in the Australian Qualification Framework, a scaffold sequence of qualifications in constant flux through the changing nature of public / private and sectorial education and training delivery.

AQF

In order to establish a hierarchy to academic qualifications the Government instituted the Australian Qualification Framework or AQF which was illustrated by a ladder or framework with an ascending order from Certificate 1 to PhD.

A recent review of the AQF titled Second Edition [1] was released in January 2013 with a circular, clock face style diagram of qualification, replacing the vertical ladder, with Certificate 1 placed at the top at 12 o’clock rolling through the classifications to the PhD which nestles alongside the certificate 1 at 11 o’clock.

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Figure 1. Australian Qualification Framework (AQF) wheel as opposed to ladder hierarchy.

The objectives of the AQF are to provide a contemporary and flexible framework that:

• accommodates the diversity of purposes of Australian education and training now and into the future

• contributes to national economic performance by supporting contemporary, relevant and nationally consistent qualification outcomes which build confidence in qualifications

• supports the development and maintenance of pathways which provide access to qualifications and assist people to move easily and readily between different education and training sectors and between those sectors and the labour market

• supports individuals’ lifelong learning goals by providing the basis for individuals to progress through education and training and gain recognition for their prior learning and experiences

• underpins national regulatory and quality assurance arrangements for education

• supports and enhances the national and international mobility of graduates and workers through increased recognition of the value and comparability of Australian qualifications

• enables the alignment of the AQF with international qualifications frameworks and training

• supports and enhances the national and international mobility of graduates and workers through increased recognition of the value and comparability of Australian qualifications

• enables the alignment of the AQF with international qualifications frameworks.

Higher Education

The traditional view of Higher Education through Universities grew from a ‘Gentleman’s Club’ where the privileged of Western Society followed pursuits in Science and the Arts.

With the growth of the middle classes we have witnessed a development in professional education. From Law to Architecture, Medicine to Economics, what was a pastime and area of interest, education moved focus to areas of professional practice.

Traditional Higher Education has deluded itself in thinking that it is not providing ‘vocational education’ where a vocation has been seen as a way of earning a living through provision of labour, which was never a concern before among the gentry.

Yet the Australian experience of competency based education (they don’t train in Higher Education) has been to not participate in the discourse of pathway and ‘fit to model’ sticking with the traditional curriculum based education platform.

This attitude made the fit from a bottom up industry driven need for training sadly lacking, with a loose or sloppy fit for transition from AQF level 6 to the Bachelor Degree.

The keyword here is capability, where a qualitative assessment will grade a student’s performance across the scale of “fail to high distinction”.

Vocational Education

With the move to improve productivity a focus developed in training of tradespersons / artisans, and developed as a vocation as opposed to a profession. Trade training or artisanship from apprenticeships to master craftsperson training is considered differently in many countries.

In Europe the Technical Education sector or trade training is held more highly than in most other western countries. Countries such as Germany and the Nederlands have a higher regard for Technical Education and have made a break from a traditional English model, if I can call it that.

Australia as with India is a former colony of the British Empire and has the remnant vestiges of the education context which is difficult to shake off.

The real difference at vocational education level, if we are to assume the Western model, is the “task based’ training deconstruction of the world of work.

At Certificate 1 level a clerical task is broken down to say the competent turning on of a computer all the way to the Certificate 4 where advanced use of clerical applications is the competency.

Worldskills [7] (@worldskills) recently tweeted on ‘Trade to Degree’ making a qualification jump from what in Australia would be AQF 3 to AQF 7 which in a technology environment may be practical but from an holistic view point, within a liberal education framework this jump would be too great.

The key word is competence, or competing. It is a test of whether you can do the task or not, and assessed as such. Where a pass is a pass and not divided beyond that qualitatively, as was the whole structure of Manufacturing Science as set up through the work of people like Frederick Taylor [4] and his establishment of the ‘piece rate’ regime in industry, which started the whole ‘deconstruction of labour’ with some critics derisively disparaging ‘lean’ practice as ‘Taylorism’.

Capability and Problem Based EducationThe different approach to Higher Education or top down approach to Education as opposed to training looks to achieve ‘capability’ through the solving of problems through ‘problem based learning’ is part of the ability to critically analyse information gathered through research.

Curriculum based design education delivered in studio as projects allow for experiential learning, experimentation and trial and error, all part of design based research and development techniques.

New thought in innovation sees development of skillsets in ‘creativity and innovation’ along with ‘soft skills’ as being the base key selection criteria for the manager of today. In Australia the Karpin Report [5] traced the manager profile of the 1990’s giving a projection towards 2010.

The report indicated eight main areas for skill improvement as:

• Soft or people skills

• Leadership skills

• Strategic skills

• International orientation

• Entrpreneurship

• Broadening beyond technical specialisations

• Relationship building skills across organisations

• Utilisation of diverse human resources

In 2011 the Australian Government Skills Council, Innovation and Business Skills Australia (IBSA) produced a document titled ‘Karpin Report revisited: Leadership and Management challenges in Australia [6] which identified as an extension of Karpin’s ‘Entrepreneurship’ that Creativity and Innovation (IBSA 2011:p11) were key skillset comprising of:

• Promoting an atmosphere where creativity can flourish

• Building a physical environment where creativity will be encouraged

• Managers setting an example by being open and stimulating in their behaviour

• Using brainstorming sessions to engender ideas

• Encouraging and welcoming ideas and creative suggestions from employees

• Discussing and challenging ideas

• Allowing employees’ time and space to ‘breathe’ and think around ideas

• Using management systems, such as self-directed teams to help employees spin ideas off one another in creative ways.

Problem based learning (PBL) has widely been endorsed academically but only implemented sporadically, Singapore for instance has embraced PBL as key to their prosperity. But few have adopted an education response to include PBL from academic year K through to Y12 (in Australia these years are classified as compulsory education years) with many countries only instituting PBL in post compulsory education or Tertiary / Higher education years.

Clearly, with this embracing of design thinking and innovation, design education stands to move to prominence, bringing creativity to management and innovation as well as design to industry.

Competency and Task Based Education and Training Cartledge & Watson [3] researched Australian design teacher concerns about the adoption of competency based training within the AQF 5 and 6 levels as para professional qualification interfacing with Higher education AQF levels 7 or under graduate / bachelor degree.

The concerns raised indicated that the selection of standardised ‘units of competency’ to build a design education programme had raised grave disconcertion.

The skill sets needed at AQF 1-4 were different in the increasing degree of analyse needed at AQF 5-6 to lead to the development of critical analyse in the AQF 7 through to 10 levels.

The report concluded that:

“To move forward, we now need to get on with identifying where we can improve practice through innovation and creativity, including identifying where it is appropriate to get ‘back to the future’ with both established and emerging pedagogies for design. It will require an open dialogue with industry and the investment of risk capital to properly evaluate the effectiveness of design practices for managers.

Business-trained managers (and management educators) will need to be informed and prepared to embrace design practices. Similarly, designers as design educators will also need to be open to adjusting their practice in commercial contexts. Without developing the capacity to take risks to open up new ways of dealing with old problems, there cannot be a sensible amalgamation of approaches.”

And in finalizing:

“If we are truly focused on design education in a VET sector strategically positioned in a knowledge based society, we should be creating educational opportunities that resonate with the tenets of social, economic and environmental sustainability. This is not seen as significantly different from the responsibility that befalls all other educators in the twenty-first century, but if we dedicate ourselves to the design rather than repair of vocational programs, there should be fewer educational ‘bullets’ to dodge.”

SUMMARY - FUTURE RESEARCH

Aristotle [2] is quoted as writing “The whole is more than the sum of its parts” If competency based education is classed as the square peg, an apt descriptor with its following from manufacturing science and the Taylorists, then Design Education and Education at all levels, especially management education can benefit from design education as an holistic practice.

Playing it forward, design education in India should give careful consideration to this middle ground, the main work needs to be done at this transition, and see it as an opportunity to turn a square peg into the round hole of design and higher education.

REFERENCES

1. Australian Qualification Framework 2013, Australian Qualifications Framework, Australian Qualification Framework Council, viewed 17 February 2013, http://www.aqf.edu.au/Portals/0/Documents/2013%20docs/AQF%202nd%20Edition%20January%202013.pdf

2. Aristole, Metaphysica, 10f-1045a

3. Cartledge, D., and Watson, M., 2008, ‘Creating Place: Design education as vocational education and training’ NCVER, Adelaide. Viewed 17 February 2013, http://www.ncver.edu.au/publications/2022.html

4. Encyclopaedia Britannica 2013, Frederick W. Taylor, viewed 17 February 2013, http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/584820/Frederick-W-Taylor .

5. Commonwealth of Australia 1995, Enterprising Nation: Renewing Australia’s Managers to meet the challenges of the Asia-Pacific Century (Karpin Report), viewed 17 February 2013, http://www.aim.com.au/research/EN_ReportonSkills.pdf

6. Innovation and Business Skills Australia 2011, Karpin Report Revisited: Leadership and Management Challenges in Australia, viewed 17 February 2013, http://www.ibsa.org.au/Portals/ibsa.org.au/docs/Project%20Related/Business%20Services/leadership%20and%20produtivity%20reports/IBSA%20REPORT%20-%20Karpin.pdf

7. Worldskills 2013, Can the trades to degrees gap be bridged, viewed Twitter, 17 February, 2013, https://twitter.com/WorldSkills/status/299453767521292288