Jennifer Westacott to be chancellor of Western Sydney University

As chancellor of the Western Sydney University, Jennifer Westacott wants to tackle the ‘great unfairness’ which afflicts the region.

Business Council of Australia chief executive Jennifer Westacott will be the next chancellor of Western Sydney University. Picture: Toby Zerna

As the next chancellor of Western Sydney University Jennifer Westacott says she will tackle the “great unfairness” imposed on the population of the Sydney’s sprawling west who endure social disadvantage, earn lower incomes, have lower quality services and battle longer commute times.

Ms Westacott, who will continue as chief executive of the Business Council of Australia when she takes on the university role in January next year, said she is passionate both about education and about western Sydney.

“So it’s a chance to bring my two great loves together and really make a difference for people in western Sydney, but also influence some of the things I think need to be done in higher education,” she said.

As chancellor Ms Westacott will head WSU’s governing board and, because the university has annual revenue of nearly $1bn, it puts her into a position with similar influence to the chairman of a major company.

WSU vice-chancellor Barney Glover (who is the equivalent of the university’s CEO) said Ms Westacott was “an exceptional choice” for chancellor who understood the university’s role “as an anchor institution for the socially diverse, culturally vibrant and economically important western Sydney region”.

Professor Glover also paid tribute to the current chancellor, former Prime Minister’s Department chief Peter Shergold, who will retire in December after 12 years.

Ms Westacott said she would like to see universities focus more on helping students develop “employability skills” such as design thinking, computational thinking, teamwork and effective communication.

“I know WSU is doing some of these, teaching things in a project-based way,” she said. “That means that they (graduates) come into an employment situation absolutely able to hit the ground running.”

Since 2019 Ms Westacott has also been chair of Western Parkland City Authority, the NSW government agency charged with attracting and co-ordinating investment to Sydney’s west, a region being boosted by the advanced manufacturing and research zone that will be adjacent to the new Western Sydney Airport.

She said WSU can play a “catalytic role” in building the skill foundation and help make the area a magnet for investment. She thinks the right mix of education, skilled jobs and investment can be transformative is dealing with social unfairness.

“I passionately believe in correcting that unfairness and making sure that kids growing up in Penrith, and kids growing up in Liverpool and Campbelltown … grow up with incredible opportunities to get the best education in the world,” she said.

Ms Westacott brings her own experience – as a child who grew up in public housing in the Blue Mountains and Sydney’s Central Coast – to her new university role.

She said that, for her, university was a “catapult into a new existence”, exposing her to ideas and ways of thinking which were then outside of her experience.

“I want that for every kid in Australia and if I can deliver that to every kid in western Sydney, I’ll go to my grave a happy person,” Ms Westacott said.