Bureaucracy and my Waterloo: The Certificate 4 in Workplace Assessment

Bureaucracy and my Waterloo: The Certificate  4 in Workplace Assessment

When I saw the writing on the wall in Kuching–a few months before I left I started considering other options. I was so disillusioned with the Education racket and I considered other things –including training to become a bus driver in Brisbane.

But what I  really wanted to do was  teach refugees English in Australia–or migrants. When I looked up on the websites I noticed that most of this was carried out in TAFE Colleges.

I thought I would be well-qualified to teach English in TAFE.

But I was wrong!

TAE40110 - Certificate IV in Training and Assessment

If you Google it you will come up with something like this.

In this course you will…

• learn to plan and design learning programs
• learn to best facilitate learning and assessment for groups and individuals
• develop skills for effective training in the workplace

Sounds like a simple teacher training course for school leavers?

Well, I understand that that is exactly what it was designed as.

What it has become now is a great big Government TAX on anyone who wants to teach English to foreigners–including highly qualified and experienced teachers like myself.

I was told I could not teach refugees in Australia unless I had this certificate even though I had the following qualifications…none of which schooleavers had

A 4 year honours degree in science

Two one year full-time Post Graduate Teaching degrees-one in in science and one in teaching English as a second language

Two one year full-time Masters degrees-one in Education in developing countries –the other in teaching English as a Second language

One doctoral degree–in the area of professional development of Teachers

Thirty-five years of teaching experience in schools and Universities in Australia, Mexico, Colombia, Ghana, Malawi, Ireland , England, Dubai, Malaysia and Brunei

At first I thought ..oh… well I suppose I’ll have to do the bloody thing.. it’ll be easy! So, still in Kuching , as an insurance policy against rumours the project was going to be terminated, I signed up to do the first three day part of a  six day residential course to take place in Adelaide at Christmas  2011.

1500 dollars for a course with 50% recognition of my prior learning (but no reduction in price)

I emerged from the 3 days in Adelaide in a daze …..

The course consisted of about a dozen odds and sods-most of whom were ‘Tradies’. There were no other academics.

The lady delivering the course for 3 days was a pleasant settler but completely unintelligible to most of us because she appeared to be using a  language other than English... Later, we realised that she was in fact using English-it was just that she had used so many new words which no-one had ever used before-corporate jargon, or as George Orwell would have said –‘Newspeak’ words like (‘competencies’  rather than ‘skills’ ) New words had been invented to replace old ones which even blind Freddy knew..

Slowly people started to look at each other and say things like ”Am I in the correct course?...Is this what you thought you were signing up for?

People were bemused and  completely befuddled.

The bottom line was  course was a load of crap to people who were not school leavers. A course  by bureaucrats to tax in particular new arrivals to Australia and indeed new arrivals to teaching.

It was gobbledygook and completely unintelligible to most of us. I could not actually understand what the lady was saying and nobody else in the room could either.

I was told I had to do some ‘teaching project ’ in the next few months in Malaysia and then come back and complete another meaningless session in Adelaide

I also felt humiliated at not being able to understand the jargon.

So I went back to Kuching and of course within a couple of months  I had  decided that the project was irredeemable and flew straight back to Adelaide

There was no way I was going to finish that ridiculous course for schooleavers.

This was my line in the sand –the straw that broke the camels back. Perhaps it was also  my ‘Waterloo’

I wasn’t going to give up without a fight

I wrote to the relevant Government Department complaining that the course was not fit for purpose for someone such as myself. They simply qupted the regulation back tome requiring me to do it.

I then wrote to my  MP asking if she could arrange for me to speak to someone about it.

Of course I go the predictable runaround form the bureaucrats-her minders.

They also quoted the regulation. Other than that there was no response to my E-mails. About forty-five of them in all.

Eventually I looked up the relevant Minister in  charge. I wrote again –dozens of E-mails  were sent without a response. Other than to say that the regulations required me to  do it.

My request for an explanation as to why someone of my experiecne and qualificationsa and experience should have to do the course was ignored.

I couldn’t get past the Minister’s  minders.

Eventually I got through to one mid-level official of the Department of Employment on the  phone..

Yes sir…how can I help?...

To my astonishement she said ‘Oh yes.. my husband did that- there must be some part of it which would be useful to you…”

Yes...and what particular part of the course would that be? I thought to myself. Perhaps the part where I am taught how to tie up my shoelaces?

I have been teaching in schools and Universities  for 35 years in every continent of the planet . I have many teaching qualifications-too many qualifications-most of them paid for by myself. I have trained teachers. I have trained the trainers  of teachers

So…why do I have to do a meaningless unintelligible course designed for school-leavers?

It is just another way for the Government to collect revenue and employ trainers.


There is a limit to just how much stupidity one can tolerate in a lifetime!

When I die I have given instructions for the following to be inscribed on my tombstone...

R.I.P.

"To be completed...

The Certificate 4 in Workplace Assessment"



This is my line in the sand...it may even be my 'Waterloo'

I won't do it!