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ON CAMPUS examinations or remote proctoring – perhaps a new market in itself . An agile and cost-effective methodology is required here .
Despite the challenges , online platforms have enabled learning to continue throughout lockdowns , quarantine and travel bans . The question remains : will international students continue to pay a premium for a degree earned from their bedroom ? Perhaps .
Another opportunity arises here for universities to invest further in digital capture and presentation of recyclable learning content to lower delivery costs and potentially expand international student numbers . Short videos or other learning objects presenting key ideas with editable embedded modules that can be consumed anywhere at any time would be a reasonable goal . A renewed focus on currency and insight should uplift the quality of undergraduate learning and expand the potential student base .
Taking the next step , international students of the near future may seldom attend the host campus , and access physical university resources from their own country . With such a light capex footprint , universities could potentially operate from any corner of the world .
What campus services are required for a high-quality student experience and what aren ’ t ? Conventional wisdom : The campus should be peppered with casual learning and private study spaces , retail , hospitality , health services , outdoor amenity , sports facilities to create a learning and social community .
Sports facilities , cafés , bars and retail feature in most campuses . These require capital to develop , wages and expenses to run . Although some may generate revenue in the form of rent , they are not core business activities . They are provided to attract enrolments by providing lifestyle enhancements to staff and students .
The link to core-business for such resources is bound within the concept of the ‘ sticky campus ’. But can universities sustain these costs moving forward ? Are there opportunities for the campus to integrate with external providers to create a fringe zone of the campus to host these services which is commercially developed and operated ?
What is our business model ? Conventional wisdom : Full-fee students subsidise government capped funding for local students .
The dependency on international student numbers to bolster revenue has driven universities in a blind pursuit of international rankings . As with any KPI-driven culture the reward for hitting metrics at the expense of common sense creates skewed outcomes .
Most of the ranking systems are heavily biased towards universities with reputational heritage and research profiles . Interested parties should therefore be aware that ranking systems generally promote wellestablished more traditional universities and do not give much credit to younger universities , which might be more focused on producing job-ready graduates . The university ranking systems themselves are multi-million dollar businesses which charge a fee for universities to participate and then charge again for passing on student referrals and to advertise on their websites . It is essential that students focus on their own requirements and how they can best be met . Likewise , universities should take this opportunity to pivot their focus towards success metrics which are relevant for local students to guide capital investment and campus master planning .
How do we challenge the conventional wisdom ? Staff and students are currently required to direct or complete coursework online from home . In many cases home means a jurisdiction outside of Australia . International students who returned home during the first wave of the pandemic now face considerable barriers to re-entry . This has triggered a forecast revenue hole across the sector of $ 4.6bn per annum .
INITIATIVES
Why not ?
• Reimagine and repurpose existing campus services assets to reduce operating costs and redefine their potential contribution to the campus and the general community .
• Improve agility within the learning institution to derive performance under changing conditions . Consistent innovation investment underpinning the ways that learning content is captured , presented and updated using best practice technologies to provide feedback loops and peer connectivity .
• Leverage existing capital to meet the needs of all with limited resources .
• Restart economic activity driven by equity of need
How ?
• Predictive analytics is the science of collecting data sets which are indicative of certain performance , then building a model where interdependent inputs can be varied to identify trends or outliers and determine efficacy . For example , a campus model could be built from relevant data points throughout the academic term such as course enrolments , climate and Federal Government policy changes mapped against space utilisation . The input data can be manipulated to simulate future possible scenarios and thus provide a relative measure of the resilience of an asset . This can be used to prioritise CAPEX to align with potential external disruptors or innovations in the learning delivery plan .
• Establish and participate in local community and business networks to build local economies .
What ?
• Conduct a stakeholder consultation process starting with a virtual workshop to build a mud-map of the organisation including a governance and conflict escalation process . A bespoke briefing tool is then used to identify values within the patterns of decision making . Values are the filter by which decisions are made . With these values we are able to unlock the potential of the organisation and plot a sustainable development pathway .
• Predictive analytics creates data rich models to generate activity heat-maps to overlay with sustainability objectives to identify potential alignments and vulnerabilities .
• Build a network of hubs or Centres of Excellence across partnerships and sites .
• Conduct feasibility analysis and preliminary reporting for proposed CAPEX prior to generating a full business case . ■
Vaughn Lane is director of Why Not ? a multidisciplinary team focused on the intersection of the economy , the city , culture and technology .
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