Scientist told he needs Cert IV to teach at TAFE - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Moshly
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 24, 2017, 07:41:04 am
content: I just found thishttp://www.news.com.au/finance/work/careers/scientist-told-he-needs-cert-iv-to-teach-at-tafe/news-story/6a941b287e164737fa15e98693e636a9When I went to TAFE in 1991, all the best teachers were ex ADF or ex Telecom (Telstra).A couple of years after I left a friend did the same course and said it was terrible.This was one of the 2 leading institutions in Victoria at the time (for TAFE level electronics, CBE, Tech Cert, Associate diploma etc..).All the long term people had left and none of the replacements had any tech / industry experience.The lectures have no clue, when he needed help they just referred him to the subject bookletHe knew more than they did (he was interested in amateur radio and audio as a teen)(He passed in the end)Sounds like its actually gotten a lot worse for all subjects

author: John B
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 24, 2017, 09:16:37 pm
content: This is a problem across a range of subjects and institutions, ie TAFE and state variants like CIT, and even universities. A very similar situation happened to a friend of mine - had a long career in the field, taught at tertiary level, was then told he needed a Cert IV in blah blah whatever in order to teach adults at a TAFE.One problem at TAFE or university is that the people making these decisions have no idea what qualifies someone in a field. At university its a PhD fetish: A PhD thesis on some obscure barely relevant topic can supercede a long career of practical experience, because the person doing the hiring has no clue.

author: Someone
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 24, 2017, 10:03:53 pm
content: Quote from: wilfred on January 24, 2017, 09:40:16 pmWhich is great for sustaining the research side of a university but the better undergraduate lecturers lean more to the educational side than academic side. Universities want to be solely academic, but are required to provide education. Its best delivered with a mixture of people with different passions.You'll see a lot of "education" jobs now requiring just the cert IV in training and assessment, since thats whats required to tick off on the assessment against one of the 60,000 odd "units of competency" currently recognised. The employer does not care about the quality of education, just that they can profit from it. You'll often get better education from informal situations but that doesn't get recognised when you want to get a job. We've ended up in a box ticking society that goes around ticking its boxes for the purpose of ticking boxes.

author: John B
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 24, 2017, 10:05:46 pm
content: I have experienced my old university sacking an entire faculty, all of whom had long careers, but many did not have PhDs. They were all replaced by people of far less experience and practical knowledge, but all ticked the PhD box, even if the thesis was on some marginal topic. There's quite a few administrators that deserve much more than a few snarky comments.This isn't a jab at the attainment of a PhD. Its a jab at the actual administration and hiring decisions of institutions, and the poor teaching outcomes that result.

author: SL4P
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 25, 2017, 04:27:05 pm
content: It's a similar problem that we see in wider politics.Back in the 70's and early 80's there was a community-wide push for 'professional' leadership - but it got out of control, putting qualifications ahead of experience, Salaries went up, while skills went down.Now the risk-assessment teams have identified being 'non-certified' as a risk...!That's working well (not!)

author: CatalinaWOW
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 25, 2017, 06:01:40 pm
content: Just to be a bit of a devils advocate here, the last five or six years before my retirement I spent a fair amount of time teaching classes in my company. Transferring knowledge and skills to a younger generation. After a couple of years of this the company wasn't particularly pleased with the results, either from my classes or from most of the others that were going on. So they sent us off to a school on how to teach. I can't speak for others, but it improved my ability tremendously. Teaching is a skill, and a teachable skill.I don't know what the certification identified entails, but if it includes training in teaching methods it has some value. Based on my own experience with research faculty in college and grad school there would be value in this type of training for many of them.

author: Buriedcode
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 25, 2017, 06:46:32 pm
content: I agree with CatalinaWOW, whilst many say "those than can, do, those that can't etc.." being knowledgeable and experienced in a field doesn't automatically make someone a "good" teacher. And by that same token, being inexperienced in a field doesn't necessarily make someone a 'bad' teacher. Now, from that article, I gather he has experience in teaching, but there are reasons for teaching certifications - like any other certification, to prove to others that you have taken and completed a course.The best lecturer I had in school was my Maths teacher, who was fresh out of of a teaching course, very wet behind the ears. Similarlly the worst teacher in school had been there 30 years, and in all that time was teaching the wrong curriculum. In university it was a similar mixed bag - those with PhD's seemed to be anything from excellent to half-arsed.I'm not entirely sure what the fuss is about? If he wants the job, then he should get certified as it is part of the job..

author: CatalinaWOW
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 25, 2017, 09:52:57 pm
content: Quote from: Buriedcode on January 25, 2017, 06:46:32 pmThe OP may have had experience teaching. Doesn't mean he knew how to teach. As you pointed out in the first paragraph. I had several years of teaching experience, both in that end of career work and teaching at a couple of different university courses before I was exposed to formal training in teaching. I can look back at what I did and see any number of things I could have done far better, with the result of more interested and better educated students.I still won't endorse any certification blindly, since I have seen any number of certifications in engineering and other fields including teaching that are just a paint be numbers exercise in controlling the amount of competition in a field. I just wanted to point out the possibility that it was worthwhile.

author: VK3DRB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 25, 2017, 10:43:41 pm
content: Today few engineers have any idea about things such as serviceability of a machine they might be engaged in designing because they have never worked as technicians. How many EE's who do PCB design back annotate there designs? Most would not even know what that is. What about test points? DFM? DFT? Or using the fewest numbers of screw types, or having board replacements simple, quick and easy? This comes with experience and knowledge. I have seen too many smart arse EE's design boards forgetting test points or the ubiquitous ground point for an oscilloscope probe etc. I have seen bad designs in the practical sense, literally sending companies to the wall.The world should adopt France's system: EE's have to also to be trained as technicians.Maybe the engineers should have at least 5 years's field experience as technicians before embarking on an engineering degree course. And teachers/lecturers should have at least had 10 years field experience too.

author: Jeff_Birt
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 26, 2017, 02:21:07 pm
content: Working at an engineering university it amazes me how many students show up with no hand on experience. I grew up taking things apart and trying to put them back together, building projects, etc.At university (in the USA) they will get little hands on experience unless they seek it out. There are student design teams that design and build various things, internships and research opportunities as well. These things are not part of the standard curriculum though. My university has a heavy emphasis on research and much of this is done in conjunction with industry so it is real world, hand on experience but not every student gets involved in that way.I used to teach the lab sections of a couple of courses (300 and 400 level) and the projects were often based on research projects we were doing at the time. The project was open ended meaning the professor and I would dream up the project and act as the customer who wanted this thing built. We tried to come up with reasonable ideas but did not know if they would actually work; we tried to make it as 'real world' as possible. Many students, even in these upper level classes, had never been faced with a task where there was no answer in the back of the book. I can remember one student getting upset asking 'How should I know how to do this?', I responded with 'Welcome to being an engineer.' After a few weeks of researching the task and asking questions his attitude changed as he was learning to apply the theories he had learned previously.Many of our professors have industry experience, some have been academics their whole life but have always worked with industry and some are just academics who know the theory but not how to apply it. Being a good teacher is not a qualification for a professor in most cases unless you go for a non-tenure tack teaching professor position.

author: cdev
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 26, 2017, 02:49:59 pm
content: This is tied into the commoditization of education as an export/import industry. Trade agreements require specifications for staffing be defined in "objective and verifiable criteria" which means formal degrees. Professional experience and/or recommendations will always lose out to formal credentials under neoliberal "reforms". Its also very much a class thing.

author: EmmanuelFaure
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 26, 2017, 09:16:24 pm
content: Quote from: VK3DRB on January 25, 2017, 10:43:41 pmSeriously?

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 26, 2017, 09:28:02 pm
content: Quote from: EmmanuelFaure on January 26, 2017, 09:16:24 pmIt doesn't seem that surprising. For example in my field (chemical engineering) the professional training required to become chartered is quite broad, and doing a welding course to learn how pipes get welded in a chemical plant could contribute to that training.

author: VK3DRB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 27, 2017, 11:45:50 am
content: Thinking about this further, I suspect actual general practical ability has its roots in a person's upbringing, and less so in your education.I remember my dad as a very practical man (a carpenter). He also tinkered with electrical stuff. He was the benchmark of being a jack of all trades and everything he built, he built like a craftsman. He was my role model. But dad died suddenly from a heart attack when he was 38 years old. I was 11. Mum was chronically ill as well and could not work, so she had to bring up three kids on a widow's pension until she passed away 10 years later. I can tell you, growing up was bloody tough compared with most other people in Australia, especially those rich enough to attend private school. Having to work whilst studying at high school and university is a hard road to travel.But the good thing that came from this unfortunate experience was I had to learn to mow lawns (from the age of 11), fix the mower, fix cars, fix bikes, make concrete, learn carpentry, gardening, plaster and paint walls, and fix most things around the house. There was no other choice. I learnt through trial and error and sheer determination. From my observations, most of those born overseas who grew up with servants, or those born into rich families in Australia who wanted for nothing, lack many basic practical skills. Not always, but mostly. In any case, rich or poor, those who owned the early Lego sets, a Tandy 150-in-1 Electronic kit, or Philips Mechanical Engineer set had some advantage in wiring their brains to be practical and in many cases helped forge life long careers.Since those days, I have built two homes, including my own 400 square metre house (literally), constructed other several buildings, rebuilt a car ground up - including the engine, gearboxes etc, done concreting, plumbing, painting, electrical work, house renovating, fixed radios, TV's, VCR's, computers etc, built towers and LPDA arrays for HF, built home brew RF transmitters, RF modems etc etc. I am the extreme DIY and to have to employ a tradesman to do anything is somewhat shameful. Today, I am an electronic design engineer (medical devises mainly), and love doing electronics at home. I think my dad would be proud if he were alive today.So through adversity some good things can come. In some ways I am a lot richer than those born with a silver spoon in their mouths.The three A's to success areAptitude,AbilityandAttitude.Aptitude and Attitude comes from upbringing (life as a child or teenager).Ability comes from your upbringing, education and work experience.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 27, 2017, 05:43:18 pm
content: Quote from: John B on January 24, 2017, 10:05:46 pmIt actually goes the other way too - universities are requiring PhDs even for technician jobs like running a lab because otherwise they are not able to get the position funded. So a new post-doc gets hired every 3 years, with a lot of infrastructure getting replaced and knowledge lost. Moreover, the post-doc rarely does a good job, because they aren't really specialists in maintaining equipment or supporting users, plus they are often "hijacked" to write papers and do other things for the lab.The funding is also the reason why the staff not having PhDs gets pushed out - the university will not get money for such position if the staffer doesn't have a doctorate.Also grant applicationsrequirethat the people on them have doctorates - even when the project is in 99.9% cases actually being done by graduate students and the person with the name on the paper is often little more than a figurehead for multiple grants.Academia is not very rational space, mainly thanks to these funding policies imposed by the state or grant agencies. It is rarely the university administration itself imposing these things - they have little interest in pushing out good people.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 27, 2017, 11:32:25 pm
content: Quote from: Jeff_Birt on January 26, 2017, 02:21:07 pmI've noticed that myself. I have an acquaintance who has a BS in EE, a few months ago I showed him how to solder, he'd never done it before! How does one get so far as to complete a degree in EE without ever having soldered? I was soldering when I was 10 years old. I tend to assume that anyone who designed commercial products must know what they were doing, but then I take something apart to fix it and it's like what were they smoking? Appliances are a shining example of this, when I fixed the motor inverter in my clothes washer a few years ago I discovered that the 5V supply comes from a string of power resistors directly from the rectified mains, what the hell? Last week the temperature control on the dryer stopped working and it was running far too hot, I start digging around and I can hardly believe what a ridiculous control scheme it has. The cycling thermostat has a resistor in it which when powered heats up and lowers the effective set point, that's fairly standard, but instead of a simple selector button this dryer has a fancy "Infinite Temperature" gimmick which is slider potentiometer in series with the heating resistor, with 240V run through the pot to heat the resistor in the thermostat directly! In this case the pot had burned up.

author: Harvs
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: January 28, 2017, 05:21:58 am
content: Having taught at a RTO (within a government organisation) and a university, I couldn't disagree more with the sentiment that a Cert IV in training and assessment is a waste of time. Including those coming for a different teaching background.There is parts of it that someone with a teaching background will find dull. However there is a completely different emphasis on ensuring that students meet a minimum standard of vocational skills and are fairly assessed. It's very different to how a university works, where from my experience (including being a post grad student a couple of years ago) it's really up to the lecturer how they treat and assess you.Now you can say the skill they're teaching are too basic and the teachers aren't experts, but that's not a result of the training system. It's a result of what the trade organisations mandated as the necessary skills for the certificate level.Now to look at it another way, the actual course component of a cert IV in T&A takes about 2 weeks (well that's what it took me). Then it does take you about 6 months to tick off all the practical log book entries. Most people that I know did the course then got a job that allowed them to tick off the rest of the competencies along the way (which is perfectly fine in a Registered Training Organisation.) So I really don't see what the issue is with the requirement for a Cert IV in T&A. It really only becomes an issue if you're too lazy to get on with the log book entries.