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Update via Friday's the Oz:

TAFE SA vows to fix Parafield aircraft engineer training bungle

Ken Cannane of the Aviation Maintenance Repair and Overhaul Association. Picture: Renee Nowytarger\

• Michael Owen, Annabel Hepworth
  
• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM September 8, 2017
  

Executives at embattled TAFE SA say they are determined the ­organisation will remain as one of four training centres in Australia for licensed aircraft maintenance engineers, despite a serious bungle that has left students in limbo.

About 90 students have had parts of their licences suspended after an audit in April by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority found students at the Parafield Airport campus were not assessed to the correct standards and exams had raised questions as to whether they were taught the right skills. An ongoing CASA investigation is expected to be completed this month.

TAFE SA executive director of education Brian Rungie told The Australian that the issues, mainly around administration, identified by CASA were “critical in this environment”. He said the “training itself was where it needed to be, but we couldn’t demonstrate it”.

Mr Rungie insisted TAFE SA’s aviation training, currently suspended, would continue.

“We have students from all over the country and internationally,” he said.

“We have apologised to the students. This is not who we are ... we will continue to work with our students, the industry and CASA.

“TAFE SA is committed to staying within the aviation space as one of the training providers supporting South Australia both now and going forward, and nat­ionally. We need to ensure we drive that quality agenda and make sure students get the right experience.”

Mr Rungie said there were gaps in TAFE SA’s record keeping and they had accepted no new students since the audit in late March/early April.

The situation comes amid concerns about a looming shortage of trained maintenance workers and amid calls for funding for engineering apprentice training.

Aviation Maintenance Repair and Overhaul Association director Ken Cannane said the licensed aircraft maintenance engineers in general aviation was an ageing cohort.

“We need to get the younger people in and give them the experience before these blokes retire,” Mr Cannane said.

An issue for industry is that CASA part 66, which sets out the requirements for aircraft maintenance engineer licences, is not fully harmonised with the European Aviation Safety Agency system, which can cause problems getting the license recognised overseas.

CASA is looking at the issue as part of its review of part 66.

Regional Aviation Association of Australia chief executive Mike Higgins said he wanted to see funding for the training, which ­relies now on state funding to be supplemented by the federal government to ensure adequate and consistent funding is available nationally.

TAFE SA operates a “maintenance training organisation” under approvals issued by CASA.

There are only three other centres in the country offering the training; at TAFE NSW, Aviation Australia and Federation Training in Gippsland, Victoria.

A CASA spokesman said the other centres were not affected.

More than 80 per cent of aircraft maintenance engineers in Australia have certificate or diploma level qualifications, while 3 per cent have university degrees.

&..

Training conflicts raise safety fears

VET has become an important avenue for aviation students. Picture: Darren Leigh Roberts

• The Australian
  
• 12:00AM September 8, 2017
  

• [size=undefined]JOHN ROSS
  
  Higher Education reporter
  Sydney
  [img=0x0]https://i1.wp.com/pixel.tcog.cp1.news.com.au/track/component/author/87cd1c5a9ea9d7fe70ed0978bfe815ea/?esi=true&t_product=the-australian&t_template=s3/austemp-article_common/vertical/author/widget&td_bio=false[/img][/size]
  

Conflicts between two “parallel” aviation training systems have prompted safety concerns and warnings that Australia risks squandering an opportunity to cash in on business opportunities from southeast Asia.

An Adelaide flight school has highlighted “unintended consequences” of a mismatch in aviation training, in which one stream ­focuses on Civil Aviation Safety Authority credentials and the other on vocational education and training qualifications.

The private college, based at Parafield Airport, faces Administrative Appeals Tribunal proceedings related to three students’ failure to complete VET diplomas.

The co-director of the college, Bruce Hartwig Flying School, said a VET focus on pass rates — appropriate for many disciplines but not the high-stakes world of aviation — had left colleges in a bind.

David Johnston cited Education Department requirements for colleges to achieve pass rates of at least 50 per cent in order for their students to qualify for Vocational Student Loans.

“This puts a flight school in an invidious position,” he said. “It can lose its accreditation to offer students VET funding, and potentially be out of business, if it sticks to its safety mandate.

“Or it can try to shove people through who ­potentially shouldn’t be flying, in an effort to maintain its business viability.

“The unintended consequences are horrific. I’m convinced there will be accidents if the policy’s not changed.”

Authorities shrugged off the warning. The Education Department did not comment.on safety concerns, while a Civil Aviation Safety Authority spokesman said issues relating to the loan scheme were “not under our area of responsibility”.

“If CASA has evidence of the required training standards not being met we will take appropriate action,” he added.

VET has become an important avenue for aviation students since the introduction of the VET FEE-HELP loans scheme in 2012. The HECS-style loans, which allowed students to defer paying their hefty tuition fees until they were earning reasonable wages, opened a new door into an occupation often previously reserved for ­people with sufficient cash.

The scheme was marred by wide-scale rorting, unsustainable growth and subterranean completion rates. Loans have been curtailed under the far more restrictive VSL program, which replaced VET FEE-HELP this year.

Bruce Hartwig Flying School has now lost access to VSL, and could be denied any VET funding, after the Australian Skills Quality Authority moved to cancel its registration over alleged breaches.

The school disputes ASQA’s findings, which mostly relate to activities before Mr Johnston and co-director David Blake bought the college in 2014.

The matter is being reviewed by the AAT.

A report into the first six months of the VSL scheme says no students at the school have passed any of their subjects, even though the college has attracted almost $220,000 in loans covering that period. Two other flight schools recorded similar results.

Mr Johnston said subjects typically took six months, and the students had been in the courses for only about three months of the ­period covered by the report.

He said VET measures often failed to capture the complexity of aviation training.

For example, a student might pull out of a course after earning a commercial pilot’s licence, and build up flying hours before re-­enrolling a couple of years later to obtain an instrument rating. “Statistically, we have to report that as a withdrawal,” Mr Johnston said. “That’s seen as a failure.”

He said the field was replete with “perverse” outcomes, such as students failing VET courses but nevertheless earning their aviation licences.

“Paradoxically, you can pass your course and come out with no licences. You may have a diploma, but you’re unemployable.”

Mr Johnston said problems like this could deny Australia a place in a growing export training market: southeast Asia is unable to skill up an estimated 228,000 ­pilots needed over the next 18 years. While they had traditionally trained in the US, the lower dollar had made Australia more competitive.

“From a safety and quality standpoint, Australia is arguably the best place to train in the world,” he said.

“We’ve got a huge opportunity to earn export income.”

MTF...P2