Qualifications and quality assurance leaders from government education bodies have committed to collaborate more strongly in 2025 to ensure industry and learner needs are met in the best possible way.

Representatives from the Tertiary Education Commission (TEC), New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA), and the Ministry of Education met in December 2024 with the collective of qualifications and quality assurance general managers of the six Workforce Development Councils (WDC).

This was the first in a planned series of meetings designed to explore cross-agency collaboration.

Discussions centred around opportunities to improve vocational education qualifications and quality assurance policy and regulatory settings in order to reduce complexity and cost and make sure investment in the sector was focused on responding to the needs of industry and learners.

Since October 2021, WDCs have been responsible for standard setting, developing qualifications and moderating assessments against industry standards.

The meeting was a good example of vocational education and training agencies coming together for the benefit of industry. Collaboration across the aspects of funding, qualifications framework and standard setting which overlap will result in better outcomes for the vocational education sector.

Participants agreed that there was considerable value in discussing the issues with senior representation from the respective organisations present during the hui.

Sam Egan (Manager Strategic Investment, TEC) said it was great to connect with other agencies to identify common ground as well as get a better understanding of each other’s perspectives.

Ian Funnell (Manager Policy and International, NZQA) commented that “NZQA is always keen to hear from standard setting bodies and providers about what is working, and what are the opportunities for improvement. We look forward to continuing the conversation in 2025”.

A clear output of the meeting was a desire to continue these discussions in 2025.