The latest government showdown over the budget risks not only a shutdown but jobs, regional economies and America’s competitiveness in AI and other advanced fields.
In open-source endowed research positions, professors release all of their intellectual property. Surveys of academics in the U.S. and Canada find most like the idea.
The key to supporting science innovation is funding and shaping it at its earliest stages, while innovative ventures are still housed within universities — and even before the ventures are founded.
Academics described their universities as exploitative, oppressive, toxic and fiscally driven. They felt themselves being dehumanised and demoralised by management. Most reported feelings of burnout.
Higher education didn’t feature heavily in the election campaign, yet the sector has high expectations of the new government. The key is the idea of an accord and the change in approach it implies.
Australia has world-class research but low rates of research commercialisation by global standards. The scale and cultural focus of the government’s plan mean it could have an impact on this problem.
Universities have long been developing research, talent and technology that, with the right mix of industry and government support, will allow Australia to emerge as a green export and R&D leader.
Academics in all areas have deep concerns about their ability to undertake research during the pandemic and the flow-on effects of this. Women and early career researchers were particularly hard hit.
After 11 years of Excellence in Research for Australia, the time and costs for universities and the value it creates for other sectors (none of which made submissions to a recent review) are unknown.
The sameness of the way in which universities present themselves is based on a shared view of what they think stakeholders want. Behind the official facade it’s more like ‘organised anarchy’.
Facing protests by students and academics over its Liberal Party links and generous funding by the Morrison government, the centre’s most important test will be whether it respects academic freedom.
The lack of dedicated funding and support for research commercialisation, on top of the other obstacles academics face, means Australia’s poor performance is no mystery.
The Job-Ready Graduates policy aims to remove ‘the misalignment between the cost of teaching a degree and the revenue that a university receives to teach it’. But new research challenges its costings.
At best, when universities differentiate and specialise it can marshal talent and sharpen their focus. At worst. though, this debate can present universities with a false dilemma.
The budget splashed out extra money for almost every sector deemed important to economic recovery (or politically sensitive). But with universities in a state of financial crisis, they missed out.
The federal government is right to focus on improving Australian universities’ success rate in commercialising research, but can take specific steps itself to help achieve this.
Government incentives might boost the numbers of collaborative research projects, but academics also must work on their relationships with industry practitioners to ensure everyone contributes fully.
To continue the fast-paced collaborative research and innovation we have seen during the pandemic, here are five ways universities can support health research that responds to societal needs.
More than 90% of universities in the world have been built since 1949. The vast majority built large campuses outside city centres, and all for much the same reasons.