In this guest opinion piece, Victorian TAFE Association CEO Alex White argues that schools have a critical role to play in reshaping perceptions of vocational education and preparing students for Australia’s future workforce.
Ask a school careers counsellor what “success” looks like for their brightest students, and the answer is likely to be a university offer.
For generations, a university degree has been viewed as one of the most reliable routes for social mobility and economic inclusion. However, the economy is changing, prompting many students and their families to reconsider the value of vocational education.
As artificial intelligence reshapes the workforce, threatening job security for so-called knowledge workers, skilled worker shortages have become a structural drag on national economic growth.
Victoria alone requires 1.4 million additional workers by 2034, with the vast majority of roles requiring a vocational qualification. Electricians, construction tradespeople, aged care workers, early childhood educators, and health support staff are so far proving to be “AI-proof”, and demand for these roles is accelerating.
Schools play a critical role in designing Australia’s future workforce. Teachers and careers counsellors are major influencers over how 15 and 16-year-olds view their further education options. The persistent framing of vocational education and training, or TAFE, as a fallback rather than a leading choice is quietly costing a generation of young people genuine opportunities at exactly the moment the national economy can least afford it.
There are early signs the message is getting through. Nationally, student participation in VET in Schools has reached its highest level since data collection began in 2006, with student numbers rising across almost every state and territory.
In Victoria, the number of secondary students undertaking one or more VET subjects has climbed roughly 20 per cent since 2020, to about 61,500 in 2025, accounting for approximately one quarter of students in Years 10, 11 and 12. While in NSW, commencements in VET in School programs jumped by 13,850 students to reach 58,785 between 2024 and 2025— a 30.8 per cent increase. Most of that growth has come through government schools, highlighting the significant potential for growth in the non-government sector.
While total VET participation in schools has risen sharply, growth in school-based apprenticeships — a direct and credentialed pathway into a trade — has remained flat nationally and declined in Victoria.
While this worrying trend has sparked calls for stronger industry partnerships and greater government incentives for employers, part of the challenge is a lack of understanding.
National surveys have repeatedly shown that young people and their families continue to have a limited understanding of TAFE offerings and the possible job prospects upon graduating. Research conducted by McCrindle in 2024 found that a majority of Generation Z respondents and their parents believed that TAFE graduates were less employable than university graduates, despite the institutions achieving similar employment rates.
This gap means that TAFE is far too often seen as a second choice or an option only for students who “couldn’t get into uni”, reducing career opportunities rather than expanding them.
Recent reforms to senior secondary education to align school-based VET with sectors facing genuine skills shortages, including health, community services and early childhood education, building and construction, digital and media technologies, hospitality, and engineering, have gone some way to address this. Health enrolments in Victorian VET in Schools programs have increased nearly sixfold; tourism, travel and hospitality enrolments have nearly doubled; and construction, plumbing and services, already one of Victoria’s largest VET sectors, has continued to draw strong numbers into pre-apprenticeships and plumbing in particular.
These outcomes demonstrate what happens when schools actively present VET as a legitimate, well-resourced pathway.
While the case for steering more students towards TAFE stacks up in a macroeconomic sense, there are individual benefits too. A recent report released by the Victorian TAFE Association found that 91 per cent of TAFE students achieved their employment goals, such as landing a new job, changing careers or securing a promotion. In priority sectors such as clean economy, advanced manufacturing and defence, outcomes are even stronger.
Meanwhile, TAFE graduates with a Certificate IV qualification also out-earn university graduates by almost $4000 a year, confirming that a vocational qualification leads directly to secure employment and decent pay (and without amassing a five-figure HECS debt).
Schools have a responsibility that goes beyond exam results and university offer rates. They are gatekeepers to how an entire generation understands its future, and that comes with an obligation to present the full picture of what is genuinely available, including the vocational pathways that are increasingly central to the jobs Australia will need filled over the next decade.
Closing the skills shortage and building an AI-resilient workforce will not happen through university enrolments alone. It requires schools, government and non-government schools alike, to treat TAFE as what the data increasingly shows it to be: an equal first choice, not a fallback.