Vocational Education in Australia: the Power of Institutional Language

How is it that vocational educators in Australia struggle to make sense of the institutional language of official texts that underpin their professional practice? The regulatory framework of vocational education includes prescribed qualifications, competency standards, quality frameworks, and reporting requirements. These texts are fundamental to everyday educational practice, yet they are written in complex institutional language that is typically unclear and often impenetrable. This study uses institutional ethnography to give a voice to educators who work with these texts. Written from the perspective of vocational educators themselves, the thought provoking and sometimes humorous account disrupts comfortable assumptions about the capacity of the regulatory framework to ensure quality education and training. Lauri Grace proposes a new way of understanding a text-based regulatory system that reshapes educational practice and connects it to government agendas. This book should be useful to anyone interested in Australian education and government policy, or those exploring competency based training and quality compliance more generally.