Precarious academic work, stable funding, purposeful course design and greater attention to equity are issues that students and faculty want to see addressed.
Universities and the international education sector have developed a number of concrete plans to bring international students to Australia. But they have all been shelved without a clear explanation.
Australian universities face a huge revenue hit from falling international student numbers due to COVID-19 and tensions with China. Some institutions should consider merging rather than downsizing.
The Australian government has not been good to international students since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. But compared to the US, UK and Canada, we haven’t lost our competitive edge.
The education minister has outlined reforms to higher education funding aimed at producing ‘job ready graduates’. But his announcements don’t seem completely in line with the data.
For many people, universities remain institutions embodying past imperial practices. Universities have an important role to play in society, and they must do so with society.
A Mitchell Institute report has estimated the proportion of international students in various Australian suburbs, and how much they contribute to the local economy.
Education should equip people not just with specific skills, but also with the knowledge they need to be citizens, and for occupations in which they can develop across the course of their lives.
Universities can only credibly claim to be preparing young people for their futures if they take into account the kind of world they are helping to bring about.
Many university teaching labs are empty as students have been moved off campus during the pandemic. There are other ways to put theory into practice, at home and online.
The National Tertiary Education Union has agreed to a deal with universities that aims to save at least 12,000 jobs. But universities aren’t obliged to sign up.
Hundreds of casual academics have lost work in the COVID-19 crisis. They make up the majority of the teaching workforce at universities but they don’t quality for any government assistance.
This essay explores the way the social contract between universities, society and the state has changed over the course of the 20th century. And how generations of students paid and benefited.