The course with the biggest growth in enrolments over the year at three out of four of Western Australia’s public universities is engineering, with graduates well paid and plenty of jobs on offer in the mining state.
In general, WA universities recorded an uptick in students studying science and maths-based courses across the board, with the trend predicted to remain steady when students are officially offered spots in 2024.
WA universities have one course they all say has been immensely popular in 2023. Credit: Cameron Myles/ iStock
At the biggest institution, Curtin University, the three disciplines which had the biggest enrolment growth over the year were engineering, commerce and science.
Degrees with the largest number of applications were engineering, medicine and commerce.
But Curtin revealed the degrees with the top completion rates were very different, with oral health therapy, physiotherapy and speech pathology topping the list.
At Murdoch University, there has been a high demand for the business and commerce, IT, community development and engineering courses, especially from international students.
These courses had suffered declines due to the border closures but in 2023 there was a strong resurgence in enrolments.
Several other disciplines had a decline in domestic enrolments during COVID and have had a much slower post-pandemic recovery, including nursing, environmental and conservation science, and education.
The state’s only university in the Group of Eight, the University of Western Australia, revealed courses experiencing strong growth included undergraduate degrees in engineering, psychology, and the arts.
Students were choosing post graduate study in health, information technology and education.
WA’s Top University Courses
According to the state’s Tertiary Institutions Service Centre, the top five courses based purely on applications were:
- Commerce
- Medicine
- Engineering
- Nursing
- Education
Engineering was the only course all universities mentioned when directly questioned about the top courses in 2023.
Other fast-growing courses included the master of public health, doctor of optometry, master of information technology, master of business analytics and juris doctor (law).
Edith Cowan University would not reveal which courses were on the rise.
Dr Leanne Fray studied the trends of student enrolment for years before COVID hit, and the University of Newcastle school of education senior lecturer is planning to re-start her research in 2024.
She believes the change in fee structures – many arts-based degrees now cost more and science degrees cost less than previously – would have had an impact on what students study.
“Some students are very clear on what they want to do and the cost of the degree won’t deter them, but for others who are not sure, the cost will influence their choice,” Fray said.
“If there is a degree with a higher debt but less guarantee of a job at the end, or the pay in that job will be low, students who are undecided on a future career path will factor that in when deciding what to study.”
Fray said she was unsurprised engineering was growing in popularity, given graduates were well paid and likely to get a job, particularly in WA’s mining sector.
A spokeswoman for the WA Tertiary Institutions Services Centre said overall the most popular degrees people applied for in 2022 to 2023 were commerce, medicine, engineering, nursing and education.
However, she noted that these were not necessarily the degrees with the most enrolments given not all students who applied would be accepted, especially in medicine, while others could have changed their minds.
The number of year 12 students applying for university through the Centre was also 20 per cent higher than in 2022, but last year some universities accepted direct applications from year 12 students, and this year almost all students needed to apply through the Centre.
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