SOUTH West TAFE lost a million contact hours with students last year as the impact of the former Coalition state government’s cuts hit hard.
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However, South West TAFE chairman Mike Weise said the institute was looking to a brighter future and was “getting through the hardest part of the changes”.
The loss of students due to government funding cuts and a more competitive training market left the TAFE with a $3.55 million deficit for 2014, a loss the state government met by providing a $4 million lifeline in February.
The 2014 deficit followed a $9.3 million cut in government funding last year.
But Mr Weise said he was confident the decline in student numbers and the institute’s finances could be reversed in 2015.
He said the TAFE had adapted to a new, more commercially-focused way of providing education and training services.
The TAFE’s 2014 annual report released on Thursday showed it delivered training to 9538 people for a total of 1.75 million student contact hours.
It was a reduction of about one million contact hours from recent years.
South West TAFE chief executive officer Mark Fidge said the big drop in student contact hours in 2014 was partly because a temporary high number of hours was recorded in 2013.
That total had been boosted by about 500,000 hours it provided in Melbourne under an arrangement to train Metro Trains staff, Mr Fidge said.
He said the changes in past years to the TAFE sector had forced the institute to scale back its local business, retail, administration and lifestyle training courses.
However, it hoped to gain funding from the state government’s $50 million Back to Work fund announced last month to offer business administration traineeships to local young people.
The traineeships would appeal to young people who had not finished secondary school or were on a gap year, Mr Fidge said.
The annual report also revealed South West TAFE retained its position as market leader in delivering 45 per cent of local education and training to the region.
This compares to a state TAFE average of 27 per cent.
The number of students aged 15 to 24 was above expectations at 4701, but the number of 25 to 64-year-old students was slightly below expectations at 4858.
