Urgent higher education reform is needed to fix a broken system and secure Australia’s future
The accord report on higher education calls for sweeping reforms, as the system looks to accommodate 1 million extra students by 2050.
That sounds like an extended timeframe for structured, sequenced reform.
But inherent in all the report’s findings is a pressing case for urgent action.
Higher education reform is vastly complex. Australian universities are among the biggest in the world – some 40 institutions serving 800,000 students in vastly differentiated communities, funded by the federal government under state government legislation, dealing with school and hospital systems and research funding agencies. There are legitimate business and local community expectations and an endless list of partners, stakeholders and vested interests.
Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup
The history of reform in the sector leaves much to be desired. These accord recommendations strike a frequent refrain. Many were first advocated in the Bradley review, released 15 years ago. High aspirations back then left relatively little to show.
The system has been beset by shortterm, politically inspired policies like the Job Ready Graduate Scheme, which dramatically increased the cost of some courses to students while reducing the funds available to universities per student for teaching and research overall.
Like his predecessors, education minister, Jason Clare will find it challenging to get things done.
But this is the moment, for him and the government.
The report makes it clear that the future economy will demand a highly educated workforce. It is central to our national prosperity and our global competitiveness. Australia’s future will not be built on the resources we dig out of the ground but on the skills, capabilities and ingenuity of our people across all professions.
The only way to get the desired increase in our university-educated population is to tap into those groups long under-represented in higher education: First Nations students, those from low socioeconomic backgrounds or rural and remote communities. As with schools, we must acknowledge that educating these students will cost more.
We need it to happen; it is the right thing to do. Education is the most powerful tool to overcome societal inequality: an impact beyond the individual to families and communities.
Education is the most critical nation-building exercise. The government will need to see it as an investment that reaps dividends over decades rather than an inconvenient cost burden when budgeting today.
The accord report doesn’t just find that more money will need to be spent in the future to educate more students.
It concluded that Australia’s funding model of higher education is broken.
The report finds that today, there needs to be more money for teaching and much more to support students from disadvantaged backgrounds. There is a yawning gap in research funding stemming from the decade-long decline in government and business investment in R&D, putting us among the worst of OECD countries. And schemes once supporting universities to build infrastructure for
research and teaching have long been scrapped.
Given that, it is all the more remarkable that Australia has managed to have nine universities in the global top 100.
For two decades now, politicians from across the divide have let the sector’s remarkable success in attracting international students conveniently paper over chronic under-investment from all sides of government.
These international students have been a vital asset for Australia: filling employment gaps and meeting skills needs; providing firepower in our national research efforts and being excellent ambassadors for us when they return home.
However, as global students arrived over the past two decades, government investment in the university system declined. What was once viewed as a revenue boost from international student fees has become a massive systemic dependence.
It is bizarre that the only revenue measure in the accord paper is a tax on universities themselves, who have been scrambling to fill these funding gaps with international students and philanthropy. Universities are not for profit and every dollar is invested back in strengthening their teaching and research.
Fixing Australia’s higher education funding model is an absolute priority. Failure to do so now will mean that universities cannot offer top-quality education for today’s students, let alone the millions more to enrol in future.
There is a window to get this right. The big enrolment lift happens from the early 2030s and investment needs to start now.
The government needs to lead the big investment, but it does not have to do it alone. Australian universities already contribute a far higher investment of national R&D than their global counterparts. The review of national spending on R&D recommended in the report – with a particular focus on business contribution, is welcome and overdue.
Recent decades can make one pessimistic about genuine higher education reform prospects.
Given the bleak track record, the boldness of the accord’s ambitions, and the startling projections of increased university enrolments, the question is rightly being asked: “Can this be done?”
We cannot afford not to do it. It is an investment in the future of Australians and Australia, in a fairer nation, an educated workforce and a prosperous future.
Prof Mark Scott AO is the vice-chancellor of the University of Sydney and chair of the Group of Eight
What was once viewed as a revenue boost from international student fees has become a massive systemic dependence