Too many young Australians finish school ill-equipped with the knowledge, skills, attitudes and dispositions that they need to navigate the transition from school to further education, training or employment.

This is a persistent problem that has resisted policy and programmatic effort for decades. Innovation has tended to be peripheral, unable to be scaled or sustained.

This paper provides the background to the problem and the opportunity. It examines the prevailing conceptions of success built into the recognition system in senior secondary schooling in Australia and explores how to build a more equitable system that celebrates and measures a broader and deeper conception of success.

Learning Creates Australia, commissioned this paper from our research partners, the University of Melbourne, to contribute to the evidence base for our work. The research team has gathered input from many people across education, government, business and philanthropy, including young people.

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