The document discusses the Diploma of Tertiary Studies, which is a course at Monash University designed to help students transition to undergraduate degrees. It provides an alternative pathway for students who may have faced challenges in secondary school. The Diploma acts as an assisted first year that introduces students to university expectations and allows them to gain the skills and grades to progress into a Bachelor's degree or move on to other opportunities. Students appreciate having options and navigating different pathways as they direct their own learning careers.

1. Education
Experiences and expectations
students in the Diploma of
Tertiary studies

2. Education and opportunity
 Policy logic and trajectory that widening access, raising
standards and increasing investment in education delivers
opportunity, prosperity and justice…..
 Present context of intensification of competition for
education places and for employment….
 Pathways is a metaphor that underlines the present reality
for young people leaving school that there is no longer a
single step between school, tertiary education and potential
employment
 Young becoming are becoming adept at navigating
different ways into learning and employment

3. Diploma of Tertiary Studies
 A course like the Diploma of Tertiary Studies is a
deliberate course construction that builds student
capacities for success in Monash undergraduate degrees.
A ‘step into’ higher education
 The Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) operates as
the ‘master’ policy guideline that connects learning and
qualification progression.
 In the AQF a Diploma is classified as a level 5 qualification,
whilst a Bachelor degree is a level 7 qualification
 The Diploma of Tertiary Studies is a Higher Education
Diploma, different and distinct from a Vocational Education
and Training (VET) Diploma. It is University accredited.

4. Diploma of Tertiary Studies
 An ‘assisted first year- like any other first year Monash
degree course, with a full study load over two semesters
 Four streams Arts, Education, Business and Nursing
 Two Core units EDF1010 Learning in a university Context
EDF1011 Knowledge and context
 Six stream units from first year Arts, Education, Business
and Nursing

5. Experience and expectations
 Completion of Year 12 or a graded Certificate IV.
 Grades as an indicator of capability – Certificate IV. ATAR
must be over 50- intense competition indicates that it is
usually higher.
 Course delivery occurs at Peninsula and Berwick.
 Semester One Core Unit- Learning in a university context-
introduces students to the expected academic practices
and conventions of being an Arts, Education, Business and
Nursing student at Monash
 Semester Two Core Unit- Knowledge and Context-
explores the specific nature of university knowledge across
both the social sciences and the physical sciences

6. Experiences
 In 2014 nearly 80% of the intake chose the Diploma as their
first preference; self selecting; first in family; may have
encountered challenges in senior secondary schooling-
family, economic, social; unfamiliar with expectations of
being at University
 Students appreciate pathways as a viable option to
iteratively plan and negotiate a learning career.
 Options moving into second year or having an exit
qualification at the end of the year –Diploma, that is used to
position the student in the next step of their learning career.

7. Expectations
 Emphasis on building capability and enhancing students
application of effort
 Credit grade average to progress into second year
 Over 50% move into second year, other move to other
courses at other universities.

8. Students as navigators – directors of their
own biographies
 Pathways allow for different types of transitions that involve
individual and institutional options and responses to
forming learning careers.
 Choice to pursue a pathways course such as the Diploma
of Tertiary studies signals that through such choice-making
young people stage manager their own biographies and
forge distinctive learning trajectories.