By KATH GANNAWAY
UPPER Yarra Community House has called on the Upper Yarra’s community banking sector to help keep education accessible to local students.
Faced with funding cuts in November, the Yarra Junction-based education provider has taken an outside-the-box approach to financing its government-funded accredited courses that UYCH CEO Sally Brennan says would otherwise be beyond the reach of many people in the Upper Yarra area aspiring to get a qualification.
Upper Yarra Community Enterprise (UYCE), which runs the Warburton and Yarra Junction Bendigo Bank Community Bank branches, has partnered with UYCH to provide loans to cover course fees on an interest-free basis to eligible low-income applicants.
Effectively UYCE pays the interest as a community sponsorship of UYCH.
Ms Brennan, who is also the Labor Party candidate for Eildon, said the move was driven by necessity following cuts in November that dropped their funding from $9 down to $5 per student hour.
UYCH operates as a Registered Trainer Organisation (RTO) under the Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority.
She said the not-for-profit RTO in disadvantaged areas such as the Upper Yarra already faced huge challenges before the government cuts which, Ms Brennan said, came rapidly and unpredictably and took 30 per cent of their bottom line.
She said accredited courses could cost thousands of dollars with restrictions applied to the courses, putting them out of reach of many who needed to diversify their skills to get the available jobs in the Yarra Valley.
“You can’t move to the Upper Yarra with your young family as a person with a qualification in one trade or profession and reskill in another area in which there are actually jobs because there is no government subsidy if you have an existing qualification,” she said.
She said with courses that cost thousands of dollars, the costs were prohibitive for a single parent wanting to retrain.
Ms Brennan said the cuts didn’t take into account the demographic of the rural areas or the administration burden on community-run organisations, traditionally the providers of training and education for low-income people.
“The reality for us is that our students are students who need extra support but there are now no resources to enable us to provide that support.
“What we are seeing is the most vulnerable people are the ones getting the roughest deal,” she said.
She said while there was a fee-payment program available under VRQA the level of administration by providers made it impossible to run.
UYCH instead offered, and still offers, a payment plan but Ms Brennan said the additional pressure on cash-flow was now even more critical with the cuts to funding.
“This (Community Bank) initiative has come about because we’re trying to find ways of supporting our students to achieve a qualification and break out of the welfare cycle and it shows how, at a community level, you can come up with something that addresses real community needs,” Ms Brennan said.
Yarra Junction Community Bank manager Adam Whitworth said the UYCE recognised the problem the UYCH and students in the area were racing.
“We have treated this loans program as a sponsorship to the community house, which is not seen as a grant to an individual but more a community investment in the future of our area,” he said.
