About: Don Perlgut

Community education training providers delivering government-funded vocational education and training (VET) over-perform in delivering to vulnerable and disadvantaged groups, in comparison to other providers – TAFE and the private for-profit sector. This is the key message arising from the Community Colleges Australia (CCA) analysis of 2016 data published by the National...

This week, Fairfax economics columnist Ross Gittins wrote an opinion piece on educational challenges facing Australia’s young people: “The young are mostly right, they are getting a bad deal”, Sydney Morning Herald, 20 September 2017. Much of what Gittins writes about vocational education and training (VET) in Australia is so correct that it is worth...

The South Australian Government has recognised the significant value that adult and community education (ACE) brings to the state. A new government statement, entitled Adult Community Education Program Statement: A Strong ACE Program for 2018-19 and Beyond, has just been published by the SA Department of State Development. In releasing the Statement last week, the...

This week, CCA CEO Dr Don Perlgut attended the TAFE Directors Australia (TDA) Conference in Adelaide, where he presented about leveraging economic development through VET. In this blog post, Don reflects on some of the messages arising from the conference. He observes that a while ago, Tim Costello (World Vision Australia CEO), proposed that...

The picture emerging from Community Colleges Australia’s (CCA’s) recent Annual Conference shows a community education sector exhibiting great innovation, flexibility and responsiveness, a real standard-bearer for ethical education with a high degree of professionalism. The sector manages to combine these attributes with a strong ability to work with vulnerable and disadvantaged Australians. Held in Melbourne...

Study overseas is a time-honoured way of extending life experiences as part of university education, and has more than quadrupled in the last ten years, with more than 38,000 Australian students participating each year. There is also some evidence that studying abroad helps an Australian university graduate obtain employment. The most popular...