STELA - Reporting Foundation Skills training
Understanding how to correctly report any foundation skills training activity with government funds by Community Education providers in South Australia is important.
Visit the helpful resources in our Training Provider Centre Toolkit for information about compliance with reporting requirements in South Australia.
How is Foundation Skills training activity reported to Skills SA?
Providers must report South Australian government funded foundation skills (accredited and non-accredited) training activity using the Department’s system Student Training Enrolment Logistics Application (STELA). STELA is an online application which ensures reported training activity complies with both State and National VET reporting requirements.
Note: that where activity is accredited and delivered by a Registered Training Organisation (RTO), the training activity must be reported in STELA by the RTO and not by the Community Education provider.
To apply for access visit the STELA – Obtaining access to STELA page or call the STELA help desk on 1800 673 097.
What training activity information needs to be reported in STELA?
STELA collects key information on each participant undertaking training including who they are, where the study is occurring, how the training is being funded, what module is being undertaken, the mode of delivery and what the outcome of the module is.
Participant information captured includes name, age, gender, contact and demographic details including aboriginality, employment and disability information. Each participant enrolling in foundation skills training activity must complete the Department’s enrolment and consent form. The form contains the minimum questions participants must be asked at time of enrolment in order to collect all the required information for reporting into STELA.
Refer to the STELA user guide for detailed instruction on how to report your training activity in STELA or call the STELA help desk on 1800 673 097 for assistance.
Please note that providers must provide specific funding details as specified in Attachment 4, Item 16 of your Funded Activities Agreement for each participant record created in STELA. See below for guidance on each of these attributes.
| Attribute / Activity Type | Non-Accredited Foundation Skills Activity | Accredited Foundation Skills Activity (must only be reported in STELA by an RTO) |
|---|---|---|
| Module / Competency Code | Must begin with the letters ‘NFSK’ to denote that it is non accredited e.g. NFSKCOM01 | Must begin with the letters ‘FSK’ to denote the training is accredited and part of the Foundations Skills Training package e.g. FSKCOM01 |
| Funding Type | FSN - Foundation Skills Non-Accredited | FSA - Foundation Skills Accredited (private providers) or 559 - Foundation Skills (TAFE SA) |
| Purchasing Contract Identifier | Must begin with TAFSN followed by 5 numbers e.g. TAFSN01234 | Must begin with TAFSA followed by 5 numbers e.g. TAFSA01234 |
Contact the Skills SA Contract Administration Team at SkillsContracts@sa.gov.au for assistance in using the correct Funding Type, Module Code and Purchasing Contract ID for your organisation.
What are the timeframes for reporting training activity in STELA?
Providers must report their training activity in STELA within 15 business days of a participant commencing training and again within 15 business days of a participant completing or withdrawing from training.
It is recommended providers enter enrolment details in STELA once the participant has commenced training as opposed to beforehand. The main benefit of this is that it will eliminate the need to enter enrolments where the participant never actually starts training and it also saves having to update enrolment details post commencement such as the activity start and end dates (if they change) and changing the outcome from ‘Not Started’ to ‘Continuing Enrolment’.
The Department is required to report government funded training activity reported in STELA to the National Centre of Vocational Education and Research (NCVER) on a quarterly basis for inclusion in the National VET Data collection. Providers must ensure all training activity is entered and up to date in STELA prior to the quarterly cut-off dates in January, April, July and October of each year. Refer to the STELA homepage for specific reporting cut-off dates for the current year.
How often do actual hours for a participant need to be reported in STELA?
It is expected that all module enrolments are updated to reflect the actual hours of supervised training a participant has undertaken prior to the cut-off date for each quarter. Where the participant is continuing training into the following term, remember that the activity end date will need to reflect the anticipated end date and the outcome be set to ‘Continuing Enrolment’.
Do participants need to be re-enrolled in STELA for each academic term they are undertaking training?
No. To streamline the reporting process, providers are now only required to enrol participants in STELA once for each module they undertake across a financial year. This may require providers to result the module as ‘continuing enrolment’ and keep pushing out the end date and adding hours to the enrolment until the participant completes training and a final outcome is recorded in STELA.
To simplify reporting and the amount of times a provider needs to make updates to STELA, it is recommended that at the time of creating the enrolment, the activity end date is set to be that of the expected end date in which training activity and assessment is due to end in that module enrolment. Where the enrolment is expected to continue into the following calendar year, the activity end date should reflect this by being in the following year but no later than 30 June.
Where a student commences training and withdraws from training the activity end date will need to be updated and a final outcome of Non-Assessed enrolment - withdrawn or not satisfactorily completed will need to be entered in STELA.
Note: that the activity start date for an enrolment should always be the actual date that the training activity starts for a participant in a module enrolment.
What outcomes should be used and when?
Below is a list of outcomes and when each one should be used, and which ones can be used for accredited or non- accredited activity.
| Outcome Name | Non-Accredited Activity | Accredited Activity | When to use |
|---|---|---|---|
| Not started | Yes | Yes | The Participant has enrolled in a subject, but has not yet commenced training activity. |
| Continuing enrolment | Yes | Yes | The Participant has commenced training activity but has not yet completed all the training and assessment criteria. |
| Non-assessed enrolment – satisfactorily completed | Yes | Yes | The Participant has completed the program of study in a way that satisfies the program requirements. |
| Non-assessed enrolment - withdrawn or not satisfactorily completed | Yes | Yes | The Participant has not completed the program of study in a way that satisfies the program requirements, OR the participant has withdrawn after engaging in some of the program’s activities. |
| Competency achieved / pass | No | Yes | The participant has been assessed and satisfies all the requirements for the unit of competency or module. |
| Competency not achieved / fail | No | Yes | The participant has attempted all of the requirements for the assessment and has been assessed as not competent, or as not satisfying one or more of the requirements for the unit of competency or module. |
| Withdrawn | No | Yes | The participant has engaged in some training activity, and has then notified of their withdrawal before completing all of the assessment criteria, OR stopped attending or submitting assessments (i.e. discontinues) without notifying the provider. |
| Credit transfer | No | Yes | The participant has previously completed training for the same unit of competency or module previously and no delivery nor assessment of the student’s knowledge is required. |
Are there any other reporting requirements providers must adhere to within STELA?
The Submission Progress page in STELA allows providers to monitor the progress of the reporting of their training activity to ensure their reported activity complies with both state and national reporting requirements. Where potential discrepancies are identified with training activity data these will be listed within this section of STELA for providers to review and action as appropriate. Discrepancies can include duplicate students, duplicate enrolments and missing demographic data. This section also allows providers to identify and monitor any enrolments you have reported that are un-resulted and reported with an outcome of ‘continuing enrolment’.
All discrepancies must be resolved by 31 January for end of year reporting as well as 30 June for end of financial year reporting. Refer to Section 3 of the STELA User Guide for further information on each report and an explanation of the action you need to take.
Before the 31st January each year, providers must also ensure that for any participants that commenced training in the previous year and are still continuing into the new year, that the activity end date is updated in STELA to reflect the anticipated end date in the new calendar year and the outcome must be set to ‘Continuing Enrolment’ (if not already). Any enrolments that commenced and completed or withdrew in the previous calendar year, must be finalised in STELA by updating the end date and reporting the appropriate final outcome.
What is Upfront Assessment of Need and how are these details reported?
The Upfront Assessment of Need (UAN) is the Department’s mechanism for supporting students transitioning though a VET pathway to further training, employment or upskilling. It is a process which has been designed to identify what supports are necessary to ensure students are prepared for success from the outset - whether they are undertaking VET for initial training or upskilling.
Visit our Training Provider Centre Toolkit for information about how providers must undertake a UAN process prior to each participant commencing training to ensure students get the support they need to successfully complete their subsidised training. This process must be undertaken for each financial year the student participates in subsidised training.
Providers must report the date students have undertaken their UAN at the time of creating the student enrolment in STELA.
At the conclusion of training, providers are also expected to report relevant pathway outcomes for each participant in STELA
Refer to the STELA user guide for detailed instructions on how to record UAN and Pathway Outcome details.
Where can I get more information or support?
For STELA support
If you have any STELA queries, please contact the STELA helpdesk at stelahelpdesk@sa.gov.au
or phone 1800 673 097 (9:00am – 5:00pm CST).
For general enquiries about foundation skills
Contact the ACE unit by email at dis.acec@sa.gov.au or phone 1800 673 097.