Had someone told me last summer that I would be defending public universities on the first day of next summer I would have ridiculed the idea. Somehow I believed what the Coalition wrote in early 2013…
The government’s proposed changes to higher education are a platform on which Labor can fight the next election. The strategy is simple: don’t try to modify the package, or offer new solutions. Just shoot…
The proposed changes to higher education, including the deregulation of fees, while offering potentially significant benefits, also carry significant social and economic risks. Should the bill pass in…
As I travel around the nation, it pains me to find much wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth in the senior common rooms of our universities. The academic union reports that morale has never been lower…
The University of Sydney’s Vice-Chancellor, Michael Spence, presumably achieved his political aim by announcing that his university could offer scholarships to almost a third of its students if fees were…
The Senate inquiry into the government’s proposed suite of changes to higher education has now reported. The committee came up with five recommendations, some of which were foreshadowed by Education Minister…
The government has made clear that more opportunities for Indigenous students are key to its vision for a world-class higher education system. However, Indigenous issues have received little attention…
Recent times have seen heated debates in Australia about whether higher education tuition fees should be deregulated, and about the private/public benefits of higher education. A question that goes to…
The proposed changes to higher education, including the removal of caps on student fees, have led many to question what drives students to pick a university. In a deregulated market will universities compete…
The main reason given for planned subsidy cuts to university courses has been that, with a degree, graduates will earn “a million dollars more”. Figure 1 shows how the May Budget compared graduate incomes…
Equity scholarships usually attract general support as a “good thing”. It therefore seems surprising that the Coalition’s proposed new Commonwealth scholarship scheme should generate so much contention…
Since 1990 New Zealand has introduced many dramatic “reforms” into its higher education system, many of them well in advance of Australia. A number of these “reforms” have been unwound after nasty, unintended…
The rise and rise of Australian universities in the THE World University Rankings is indeed a good news story. Eight Australian institutions ranked in the top 200, and five in the top 100; that’s quite…
Leaders of Australia’s middle-tier and regional universities are concerned that the government’s proposed higher education package will hurt their brand and their students. At a conference in Melbourne…
Submissions to the Senate’s inquiry into the higher education reform bill have now closed. The submissions are to assist the Senate in deciding whether or not to pass, block or amend proposed changes to…
The University of Western Australia recently announced its proposed post-deregulation price structure. UWA’s new fee is a flat fee of A$16,000 per year for undergraduate courses, which is significantly…
Higher education has barely been touched so far by national competition policy. It was almost invisible in the original Hilmer Report of the mid-1990s, but features in the draft Competition Policy Review…
The government’s plan to charge up to 6% interest on HELP loans has been widely attacked as unfair. Many critics, including Shadow Education Minister Kim Carr, the Group of Eight universities, Universities…
The reform of Australia’s federation is under review. In this special series, we ask leading Australian academics to begin a debate on renewing federalism, from tax reform to the broader issues of democracy…
Plans to remove controls on the number of students in England from autumn 2015 could see more universities turning to recruit students from the European Union, according to a new think-tank report. Nick…