A Pathway between VET and High Education

Our Vocational Education and Training (VET) sector, offer learners the opportunity to participate in programs that will allow them to gain the skills and knowledge required to perform a particular job. This "job ready" focus of VET programs is not the only feature of the system. Registered Training Organisations (RTOs) develop "Articulation agreements" with universities and to enable students a smooth progress into a university degree.
Articulation arrangements are defined in the AQF as follows: "Articulation arrangements enable students to progress from a completed qualification to another with admission and/or credit in a defined pathway." This is underpinned by another AQF definition: "Credit is the value assigned for the recognition of equivalence in content and learning outcomes between different types of learning and/or qualifications. Credit reduces the amount of learning required to achieve a qualification and may be through credit transfer, articulation, recognition of prior learning or advanced standing."

Articulation arrangements broaden access into formal learning and could be a potential source of credit based on student achievement though formal learning. By having articulation arrangements, RTOs provide a seamless pathway with automatic admission into a University qualification from a VET qualification. Articulation arrangements set a clear, consistent and effective pathway for learners.

The Articulation process requires that qualification developers:

• Link one qualification, commonly but not always, to another higher level qualification to establish content relationships and equivalence between them
• Make a judgment about any credit outcomes between the linked qualifications, and
• Set out the agreed credit outcomes and the defined pathway between the linked qualifications in a documented agreement; which is publicly available.

A feature of the articulation is the fact that the amount of credit as agreed by the organisations in an articulation arrangement will be applied automatically to any student on successful completion of the previous qualification in the articulation agreement.