opportunity to have their papers peer-reviewed, and these 14 refereed papers have been compiled in a single volume. The papers span a broad range of topics, including: Indigenous students and their intentions; educational pathways; skills recognition; leadership in VET providers; workplace mentoring; and the experiences of apprentices. This report is available at <>. Socioeconomic disadvantage and participation in tertiary education: preliminary thoughts Tom Karmel and Patrick Lim, NCVER This paper was written in early 2010 to encourage policy-makers to think about how to measure socioeconomic status. It also provides some data on socioeconomic status and tertiary education participation. Finally, it speculates about the likely impact of an expansion in higher education on those from a low socioeconomic background. Key messages Measurement of SES is a complex issue. While the concept relates to the characteristics of individuals and their families, for practical reasons measures based on the ABS Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) are usually adopted. SEIFA measures are very poor in classifying individuals by socioeconomic status. Nevertheless, the SEIFA measures perform quite well in measuring the aggregate relationship between SES and educational participation. An implication of SEIFA’s poor classification ability is that any policy that targets funding on the basis of SEIFA will result in the funds being badly misdirected. Some simple tabular analyses indicate that VET does a good job for low-SES individuals, and is not overly biased toward lower-level qualifications in this group. The group most likely to be affected by an expansion in the higher education sector will be those not currently undertaking post-school study rather than those currently undertaking vocational education and training. This paper also notes that SEIFA would be a very poor measure to implement any expansion in higher education aimed at low-SES individuals. This paper is available at <>. Single-sex schools and science engagement Joanna Sikora, Australian National University This paper considers whether single-sex schooling affects gendered patterns in the uptake of science courses in Year 11 and the development of science-related career paths. In particular, the author is interested in exploring gender differences relating to the take-up of the life and physical sciences. To investigate these issues, the author analyses data from the 2009 cohort of LSAY. Key messages Across all schools, male and female students systematically select different science subjects and prefer careers in different fields of science, as did their counterparts ten years ago.
Smaller-scale longitudinal surveys Life patterns Youth Research Centre, University of Melbourne 1996–current Negotiating the Life Course Project Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute, Australian National University and the School of Social Science, University of Queensland 1997–2009 Life Chances Study Brotherhood of St Laurence 1990–2012 Youth in Focus Joint research project between a team of academic researchers and the former Australian Government Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs 2006 and 2008 Student destination surveys Student Outcomes Survey NCVER 1997–current Apprentice and Trainee Destination Survey NCVER 2008 and 2010 Graduate Destination Survey Graduate Careers Council of Australia 1971–current Graduate Pathway Survey ACER 2008–current ABS surveys Survey of Education and Work ABS 1964–current Survey of Education and Training ABS 1989–current Table A2 International longitudinal youth surveys Survey Organisation Period Canada National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth Statistics Canada 1994–2009 Youth in Transition Survey Statistics Canada 2004–09 Germany German National Educational Panel Study Leibniz Institute for Educational Trajectories 2007–current Switzerland Transitions from Education to Employment Swiss National Science Foundation and the University of Basel 2001–current Swiss Survey of Children and Youth Youth University of Zurich 2006–current United Kingdom British Cohort Study Centre for Longitudinal Studies, University of London 1970–current Inventing Adulthoods Economic and Social Research Centre 1996–2010 Longitudinal Study of Young People in England Department for Children, Schools and Families 2004–current Youth Cohort Study Department for Education 1985–current USA Education Longitudinal Study National Centre for Education Statistics 2002–current National Longitudinal Survey of Youth Bureau of Labor Statistics 1979–2010, National Longitudinal Survey of Youth – Children and Young Adults Bureau of Labor Statistics 1986–2010, 2012 National Longitudinal Surveys of Mature Young Women Bureau of Labor Statistics 1967–2003 National Longitudinal Surveys of Older and Young Men Bureau of Labor Statistics 1966–90 National Longitudinal Transition Study United States Department of Education 2000–09
Western Sydney Institute 2010, ‘Enrol with TAFE to boost your wellbeing’, TAFE NSW, Kingswood, NSW. Available online at: Wray, N 2010, ‘University grads and apprentices are equally happy beyond the school-to-work transition, study shows’, Talent Egg, Toronto, Ontario.