The Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority (VRQA) released their annual Client & Stakeholder Satisfaction Research findings today. The report, available here, continues to show a very high level of satisfaction from home educators across all measures.
From a national perspective though, perhaps the most significant thing about the report is that it exists at all.
Most jurisdictions in Australia - WA, QLD and SA for example - don't undertake planned community consultation or assessment of their performance at all. Other states, such as NSW, undertake nominal consultation only. Typically, NESA, the NSW regulator sends a survey to registered home educators annually that asks 16 times "Is it clear?" - although in 2021 they didn't even do that.
It's no surprise then, that Victorian Home Educators are satisfied with their regulator. VRQA provides clear and consistent information about the registration and review process, supporting home educators to successfully navigate the process rather than just insisting on compliance. All the information is freely available via their website, with no need to phone the regulator to initiate the registration process as is seen in WA & SA.
Reasonable, supportive regulation not only improves client satisfaction, it increases compliance. Although it is difficult to measure, we think that states that make registration difficult & stressful probably have higher rates of unregistered home educators.
As Queensland prepares to review the sections of the Education Act pertaining to home education, the HEA is calling on the HEU and Minister Grace Grace to ensure the process includes meaningful community consultation.
Ideally, all our regulatory bodies would hear us.
Well done VRQA - hopefully the other States will follow suit.
HEA Survey:
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