Purpose
Industry Reference Committees (IRCs) are the formal channel for considering industry skills requirements in the development and review of training packages.
How do IRCs work with the Australian Industry and Skills Committee (AISC)?
The AISC relies on advice from 67 IRCs, made up of experts from different industry sectors, to provide advice to governments on the quality, relevance and responsiveness of Australia’s Vocational Education and Training (VET) sector. Industry engagement with IRCs is crucial to AISC’s work to endorse national training package products and ensure the VET sector delivers training to meet the needs of industry, employers and students – now and into the future.
IRC members consult within their sectors on training packages to help inform the AISC’s decisions, placing industry at the centre of effective training package development. IRCs also promote the use of VET in their sector.
Priorities
In order to meet Ministers’ priorities, the AISC seeks advice from IRCs to help:
- remove outdated and unnecessary qualifications
- ensure the training package meets the Standards for Training Packages 2012
- ensure training providers understand industry’s expectations about how training is delivered
- ensure the VET system supports people to move easily between related occupations
- create a more efficient system, through training packages with units of competency that can be used across multiple sectors
- increase recognition of skill sets.
Where training packages share common features, IRCs from different industry sectors are expected to work together.
How do the IRCs meet the priorities?
To help ensure qualifications meet the needs of employers in industry sectors, IRC members can ask questions about the training package, such as those in the diagram below.
