Finding a balance between sometimes contradictory definitions of the role of universities will be the first challenge for the University Advisory Group.
The Universities Accord final report proposes Australia adopts a ‘needs-based’ funding model. On top of base funding, there would be extra loadings to support equity students.
Universities should shift toward co-operative governance structures that foster collaborative approaches to teaching and research, which can help tackle the crises we collectively face.
The economic, civic and intellectual ends of a university education do not need to be placed in opposition to one another. A university education at its best will be attentive to all these ends.
Overhanging the whole accord debate is the question of increasing public funding for universities and academic research in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis.
From commerce to public policy, cuts to New Zealand’s university humanities departments will have repercussions well beyond the so-called ‘ivory towers’.
With the pandemic-fuelled shift to online learning, many tertiary students now miss out on the social skills critical to real-world success. That could have implications for their degrees.
Nicola Gaston, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
The crisis in New Zealand universities is directly traceable to years of sustained underfunding and means they now lack vital research and development capacity.
Huge disparities in how much students pay for courses mean graduates of high-fee disciplines will take longer to repay their debts or might never do so. That will ultimately add to government debt.
Reports of big university budget surpluses appear to undermine calls for their federal funding to increase. But a closer look at how the surpluses were achieved reveals why change is needed.
While the official figures are lower than earlier estimates of job losses, they also show certain types of employees – casual, non-academic and younger staff – bore the brunt of the staff cuts.