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Benchmarking Report of In-School Enabling Programs Across Australia
Report   Open access

Benchmarking Report of In-School Enabling Programs Across Australia

Angela Jones Dr, Fiona Navin Dr, MIchael Howie, Anita Maclaurin, Naomi Ryan Dr and Johanna Nieuwoudt Dr
ACSES
22/06/2026
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Abstract

Enabling programs, also referred to as pathway or bridging programs, form an important part of the higher education landscape, providing preparation for and access to university for students who have faced educational disadvantage, disruption, or who have not thrived in traditional secondary education systems. These pre-tertiary or pathway students “are typically from groups underrepresented at university, and/or have experienced disruption during their educational journeys” (Crawford & Johns, 2018). Whilst existing in the higher education landscape for over five decades, Enabling programs are not defined in the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) and a national framework defining standards and learning outcomes has yet to be established for Enabling programs. In 2023 the National Association of Enabling Educators of Australia (NAEEA) published the ‘Report on Benchmarking of Enabling Programs across Australia to the National Association of Enabling Educators of Australia (NAEEA)’, being referred to as the ‘NAEEA Benchmarking Project’ (Davis et al., 2023a) from here on, which detailed the comprehensive benchmarking of the curriculum, assessment, and moderation practices of nine Enabling programs in Australia. The study utilised Morgan and Taylor’s six-phase benchmarking framework and created templates for cross-institutional collaboration and consistency, and a method for reporting the project’s findings. Several smaller-scale national or institutional studies had previously explored the comparability of curriculum and assessment in Enabling programs, but none to the scale or depth of NAAEA’s Benchmarking Project (Davis et al., 2023a). As noted by Davis et al., “the establishment of a national framework can contribute to the security and longevity of the programs by setting a consensus driven by rigorous standards for all programs nationally (Sadler, 2017), fulfilling TEQSA and AQF requirements” (2023a, p. 2). Thus, benchmarking programs to identify and maintain standards, levels, and potential portability is imperative to show transparency, parity, relevancy, accountability, and program rigour within the sector, higher education, and wider Australian community.

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