Campus Review Volume 28 - Issue 1 | January 2018 | Seite 5

NEWS
campusreview.com.au
A year in higher education
Tertiary sector leaders look back on
an eventful 2017.
By Loren Smith
I
n 2017, Donald Trump was inaugurated as president of the
United States, and not long after, the Mueller investigation
began. #MeToo swept the internet and, thereby, workforces,
and North Korea scared just about everyone.
Domestically, politicians suddenly discovered their foreign roots,
and same-sex marriage finally became legal.
A lot also happened in Australian higher education.
Campus Review asked Conor King, executive director of the
Innovative Research Universities (IRU), Megan O’Connell, director of
the Mitchell Institute, and Craig Robertson, CEO of TAFE Directors
Australia, to expound on the sector’s year. The higher education
leaders also offered their hopes and predictions for 2018.
LESS MONEY, MORE PROBLEMS
Funding, naturally, dominated the conversations. King described
the government’s failure to implement its higher education reform
package as “kind of a big ‘no”’.
O’Connell seemed relieved the package had collapsed: if
per-head university funding had been capped, as the government
wished it to be, disadvantaged students in particular would suffer,
as they would be forced to pay higher fees. In the face of already
high attrition numbers, O’Connell said this move would have made
the situation untenable.
She also pointed to the latest Mitchell Institute report,
which indicates a patchy government approach to higher
education funding, generally, and particularly dire VET funding
circumstances. This, O’Connell averred, could mean fewer young
people will pursue VET careers, and as such, “won’t be training for
the jobs of the future”.
Robertson agreed. His specific worry was the government’s
proposal to extend CSP funding to sub-bachelor university
qualifications. “In some ways, I’m pleased the [higher education
reform] bill was stopped or postponed,” he said. However,
he remains concerned about the fact that a component of VET
funding – the national partnership between the Commonwealth
and states – has been terminated without a replacement. To him,
this has “exacerbated” the VET sector’s financial, and therefore
student, woes: its loan scheme is “so restrictive that it risks
dampening labour supply”.
TRANSPARENCY – WE SEE YOU
Both King and O’Connell noted that in 2017, universities became
increasingly transparent about student satisfaction and employment
outcomes. “They improved the information available for prospective
students by agreeing to present it in the same way,” King said.
O’Connell added that kinks in the university-oriented
Quality Indicators for Learning and Teaching (QILT) website
were smoothed out, yet there “could be an argument for it being
extended to VET”. She also thinks students need additional help
in navigating it, asking: “Are they using it in Year 9 when they’re
starting to find their pathways?”
THE FUTURE IS HERE, AND THAT’S OKAY
King and O’Connell again inadvertently teamed up – this time,
on innovation. Neither were afraid of facing potential chall enges
in 2017, and won’t be this year either.
“Universities have been quite strong at turning around the way
courses are delivered,” King offered. “I’ve heard the future is coming
since the 1990s … The equipment now is quite different but the
things we do are the same.”
O’Connell used VU’s new First Year Model, with its ‘block’ teaching
method, to illustrate the university’s future-readiness. In her view,
not only does it allow students to better cope with university, thereby
reducing attrition, it also enhances their soft skills.
ALL I WANT FOR 2018 IS…
King: For parts of the education system other than university – for
instance, schools and the VET sector – to work as well as they can.
“People need a good education base from school, then they
need at least one qualification following that.”
Robertson: “A renewed focus on VET.” Automation, AI and the
breakdown of workplace hierarchies herald the need for broader
employee skills.
O’Connell: A “completely aspirational” tertiary entitlement model,
whereby students solely make higher education decisions based
on transparent information, not fees.  ■
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