Education Minister tells universities to make degrees 'quicker and cheaper'
‘We need to fix this,’ Education Minister Jason Clare says, warning that a national racism survey will make ‘difficult reading’ for universities.
Degrees should be made “quicker and cheaper”, federal Education Minister Jason Clare will tell universities on Wednesday as he outlines legislation to establish a permanent Australian Tertiary Education Commission.
Revealing the new Student Ombudsman has fielded 2400 complaints in the first year, Mr Clare will chide universities over the quality of teaching as well as racism on campus.
“I think we are going to need a greater focus on teaching generally,” he will tell the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency conference on Wednesday. “It worries me that some of our highest ranked institutions have some of the lowest student satisfaction results.
“It is almost like there is an inverse relationship between international rankings and QILT (Quality Indicators for Learning and Teaching) results.
“If we are going to build a bigger system where more people want to go, we need to fix this.”
Mr Clare also will warn universities that “pretty awful things” will emerge from a pending survey of 76,000 university students and staff by Race Discrimination Commissioner Giridharan Sivaraman, who is due to report to the minister within weeks.
“Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, racism in all its repugnant forms – let’s not kid ourselves, we have challenges to confront here for staff and students,” he will tell the TEQSA conference.
“Just like the work that the former sex discrimination commissioner, Kate Jenkins, did on sexual violence in our universities, I expect this will make difficult reading. Out of it you can expect to hear some pretty awful things and it’s going to take some courage and some honesty from all of us to tackle this.”
Mr Clare will single out several universities for praise because of their innovation in restructuring traditional degrees.
Southern Cross University has moved to a six-week block model so students study just one or two units at a time in greater depth.
“(Student) satisfaction rates are up and dropout rates are down, massively,” Mr Clare will say. “They have almost cut them in half, from 35 per cent five years ago, to 19 per cent today.
“Victoria University has been doing something like this for even longer and the results are similar – their progression rate has jumped from 75 per cent to 91 per cent.”
The Education Minister also will call on more universities to improve work-integrated learning, “to make it easier to earn and learn at the same time”.
“I think there is also a lot we can do to make it easier to get the qualifications you want and you need quicker and cheaper,” he will say. “Part of that is breaking down that artificial barrier we have built up between vocational education and higher education, cracking the code of credit transfer and recognition of prior learning.”
Mr Clare will commend his former cabinet colleague, University of Canberra vice-chancellor Bill Shorten, for cutting a year from degrees for students who already have a diploma in the same field of study, including nursing, early education, accounting and graphic design.
“That saves you time, and money too,’’ Mr Clare will tell the conference.
“If you have done a diploma in accounting and next year you start a degree in accounting at UC, you will save up to $12,000.
“I want to see more examples like that, making it easier for people to get the skills and qualifications they want and need, quicker and cheaper (through a) more joined-up tertiary system.”
Mr Clare will introduce legislation to federal parliament next week to establish the ATEC, a key recommendation of the Albanese government’s Universities Accord to improve policy, administration and co-ordination for the sector.
The government will advertise for three permanent commissioners. The interim commissioners – Universities Accord chairwoman Mary O’Kane, Jobs and Skills Australia Commissioner Barney Glover and First Nations Commissioner Larissa Behrendt – will be able to apply for the permanent roles.
ATEC will set out the number of domestic and international students that each university can enrol.
It will take over responsibility for the Higher Education Standards Framework and advise the Education Minister and TEQSA.
And it will be responsible for research and data analysis of the higher education sector.
Mr Clare wants ATEC to “drive real and long-lasting reform” and to “open the doors of opportunity” for Indigenous Australians, people with a disability and students from poor families or remote and regional areas.
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