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Student enrolment

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Registration: Student Personal Details and Declaration form

Students must complete and submit the relevant Student Personal Details and Declaration form to their home school for each academic year in which they enrol. The accuracy of student details should be audited against information provided on a student’s form. Students must use their legally registered names when enrolling in a foundation secondary qualification. To verify the legal identity of the student, schools should request the student’s birth certificate or change of name document, both of which are issued only by the Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages Victoria, to ensure the accuracy of student names and birthdates.

If a student’s enrolment changes, the school is responsible for ensuring the VCE and VPC eligibility reports are run on the SBAT (VASS). By running eligibility reports regularly, schools can identify where there are issues with students not being able to meet satisfactory completion of that foundation secondary certificate. If errors are reported, they must be fixed and the eligibility report run again.

General declaration

All students must sign an agreement to abide by VCAA regulations before undertaking any studies.

Consent for disclosure of personal information to other organisations

Students must give permission for their data to be forwarded to newspapers and other government bodies for the calculation of awards and prizes, and for the Department of Education On Track survey. This must be done for each academic year of enrolment.

Permission for use of student work

Students are asked by the VCAA to grant copyright permission for the use of their work in VCAA publications and productions.

Students with past results

A ‘past result’ is any result in Matriculation, HSC, TOP, T12, STC, VCE or VCAL in a previous year. This is unless the result was achieved in the year immediately before the current academic year and the student is continuing at the same home school.

Students with past results will need to provide sufficient personal details to enable their records to be matched to database records. The VCAA database matches a student’s records based on their student number or on their date of birth, first name, family name and gender. Students who have past results and who know their student number should indicate this on their form.

If a student’s records are not matched, the student may not be awarded the certificate in which they are currently enrolled. Home schools can view all past results for VCE or VCAL achieved by students, including results from their previous school, on VASS.

Fee-paying international students

Fee-paying international students will not be able to undertake the VPC.

VET enrolment

Students should only be enrolled in the certificate and all units of competency they expect to complete in the current academic year, rather than the complete qualification. If a student does not complete a unit of competency and wishes to complete it in a following academic year, they must be re-enrolled in the following academic year.

There may be restrictions on the VET training students can undertake due to industrial arrangements, the nature of the industry from which training is derived, and/or regulatory requirements. The enrolment into a qualification designated as an apprenticeship only is not permissible where a student does not have a valid, current training plan. The VCAA requires all schools wishing to enrol students into Certificate IV or Diploma qualifications to complete an Application for Higher Level Qualifications form. The school will decide on the content of the training program in consultation with the registered training organisation (RTO).

After enrolments have been finalised, a VCE or VPC student eligibility report should be run in VASS.

Schools should comply with the deadlines (which some sectoral authorities use to determine their funding arrangements) set out in the Important Administrative Dates 2024 for the following:

  • finalising unit of competency enrolments within VCE VET scored Unit 3–4 sequences
  • finalising unit of competency enrolments for any students undertaking any certificate type (VE1, VE2 or VE3)
  • withdrawing students from units of competency from a VCE VET scored Unit 3–4 sequence
  • finalising Assessment Plan information for VCE VET scored Unit 3–4 sequences.

Student transfers between schools

There are some students who do not start and finish their VPC at the one school. The records of all such students need to be appropriately managed.

There are no formal entry requirements for VPC studies. The VPC has been designed to accommodate flexible entry and exit. Students are able to enter VPC studies at a time that best suits their learning needs, abilities and interests.

If VPC students transfer from one Victorian school to another, schools use VASS for the transfer procedure. When a student transfers to another school, the school the student is leaving is required to transfer the student on VASS, so they can be enrolled at the new school. If this is not done, the new school must contact the student’s former school and request the transfer. Students should not be transferred until the new home school is known. A student must not be enrolled at the new school until correct transfer procedures have been completed to make sure a second student number is not created. Multiple records in the same academic year for the one student may lead to the student not being awarded their VPC.

If VPC students transfer from an interstate school to a Victorian school, the school which the student transfers to should:

  • request documentation of the student’s progress from their previous school
  • apply for credit on the basis of work undertaken at the interstate school, taking into account work completed at the Victorian school, if appropriate
  • enrol the student in VPC units in the usual way
  • determine what would constitute a reasonable work program for the student for the remainder of the teaching period
  • assess the student’s satisfactory completion of units on the basis of the expectations established in the previous steps and the information provided by the student’s former school.

At this stage of the process, students cannot be credited with completing a unit by virtue of work completed at their previous school.

Students arriving from overseas

Students transferring from overseas may have late enrolments approved. Written applications should be made to the Manager, Student Records and Results Unit.

Withdrawal from a VPC study

Students may choose to withdraw from their VPC studies at any time. Student enrolments cannot be withdrawn from the database if there are results recorded for the enrolment.

Withdrawal from the VPC

Students wishing to withdraw from the VPC must first complete a Student Exit form (on VASS). It is not possible for schools or individuals other than the student to withdraw a student’s enrolment without the student’s written permission. The Student Exit form should be incorporated into the school’s exit procedures and documentation and should be stored at the school and the withdrawal entered on VASS. Withdrawal from VPC can be at any time.

Student observance of assessment and attendance rules

At the beginning of each academic year, students must sign a written declaration stating they agree to abide by the rules and instructions relating to the conduct of the VPC program.

Students must also sign a declaration that they will abide by their school’s policies and rules relating to the appropriate use of the Internet.

VPC attendance

Each VPC unit requires 100 nominal hours, of which at least 50 hours need to be scheduled classroom instruction. A student needs to demonstrate sufficient class attendance to fulfil the time and work requirements of the unit. The school sets minimum class time and attendance rules. If a student has completed work but there has been a substantial breach of the school’s attendance policy, the school may be unable to authenticate the student’s work completed across the outcome. Where the school chooses to assign an N result for the unit because the work cannot be authenticated, the school must assign an N for the outcome/s that cannot be authenticated.

School regulations determine attendance in a school setting. A school policy and set of procedures related to VPC attendance should be published and made available to staff, students and parents or carers. In other educational settings, the nominal hours may vary to allow consideration of a student’s specific needs. There is no maximum time limit for completion of VPC units.

When a student is absent from school for prolonged periods or has been unable to complete all tasks because of illness or other special circumstances, the school may, upon application from the student, grant special provision for classroom learning. In these instances, the student should not be penalised for lack of attendance. Special provision may allow a student to work from home for a period of time. Schools should make sure they retain documentation about any decisions relating to granting provisions, including supporting evidence. Advice about special provision for classroom learning and school-based assessments is provided in the Special provision section. Where a student is allowed to work from home, the school must have additional measures in place to be able to authenticate the student’s work as their own. Advice about authentication measures is provided in the 'Assessment' section.

VPC programs often include learning outside the school, including VET classes and structured workplace learning. The RTO or workplace set the expectations relating to these settings.

There is no maximum time limit for completion of units. Students can enrol in the VPC at a time of year that best suits their learning needs, abilities and interests. Some students may start the certificate in Year 10 if they require additional time to complete the course beyond Years 11 and 12.