Government forces universities to help struggling students and stamp out sexual assaults on campus

Universities will be fined nearly $20,000 each time they fail to support a struggling student with tutoring or counselling, under new government legislation.

University students will get more help to finish their degrees.

Universities will be fined nearly $20,000 each time they fail to support a struggling student with tutoring or counselling, under government legislation introduced to federal parliament on Thursday.

Sexual assaults on campus are targeted in the bill introduced by federal Education Minister Jason Clare, in a rapid legislative response to his Universities Accord review.

Mr Clare told parliament that one in 20 students had been sexually assaulted since starting university, and one in six had been sexually harassed, based on the 2021 National Student Safety Survey.

“The actions universities have taken to address this to date have not been good enough,’’ he said.

“We have to act.’’

Universities will be required to identify struggling students and intervene with academic support, financial assistance, housing information and mental health support.

The bill will force all universities and private tertiary institutions to have a Support for Students Policy, to “proactively identify” students at risk of falling behind, and set out what they will do to help them succeed.

The bill axes part of previous Coalition government’s Job Ready Graduates rules, which cancel taxpayer support for students who fail more than half their subjects in a given year.

“(This) has seen disproportionate number of students from poor backgrounds being forced to leave university,’’ Mr Clare said.

“More than 13,000 students at 27 universities have been hit by this in the past two years, mostly from disadvantaged backgrounds.

“We should be helping students to succeed – not forcing them to quit.’’

University of Sydney campus.

The bill requires universities to identify students who are struggling to complete their degree, and “assess a student’s academic and non-academic suitability for continuing study’’.

Wherever possible, universities must identify struggling students before the “census date’’ – the cut-off date when students can drop out of a degree without incurring tuition fees or Higher Education Loan Program (HELP) debts.

Students must be given access to targeted individual literacy, numeracy and other academic supports.

Trained “academic development advisers’’ must be hired to help students identify “what’s holding them back and come up with the right response for that student’’.

Academic staff must also ensure “targeted in-course support’’, including check-ins and flexibility on assessment, such as deadline extensions.

Mr Clare said universities will have to provide “sufficient non-academic supports for students, such as financial assistance, housing information and mental health supports’’.

Universities that are aware of a “significant life event’’ for a student – such as the death of a loved one or a family breakdown – must proactively offer “special circumstance’’ arrangements to help them stay at uni.

“This is important because many students struggle because of non-academic issues,’’ Mr Clare said.

The legislation includes fines of $18,780 for failure to comply with the new student support rules, based on each student or groups of students.

It fails to set up a student Ombudsman to deal with complaints, but requires universities to tell students about “protections and supports already available to them’’.

“(These include) the ability to obtain refunds where their university has failed to properly assess their ability to undertake a course, or has let them take on too heavy a workload,’’ Mr Clare told parliament.

“Or where a student has had to discontinue a course for reasons beyond their control.’’

The legislation also guarantees a taxpayer-funded place in university for every Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander student who meets entry requirements, apart from degrees in medicine.

In the wake of systemic wage theft, Mr Clare will work with state and territory governments to improve university governance to ensure staff are properly paid.

Mr Clare said he had met with members of STOP, a student-led group that campaigns against sexual violence on campus.

“They told me that in residential colleges there is no consistency of process to make a complaint,’’ he said.

“No easily available materials to inform students how to make a complaint (and) no formal feedback process once a complaint is made.’’

Mr Clare said the federal Education Department would work with STOP, End Rape on Campus and Fair Agenda to stamp out sexual violence in universities.

Federal Opposition education spokeswoman Senator Sarah Henderon called for stronger protections to “put university students first, including the right to access refunds for courses which don’t meet the grade’’.

“The Albanese Government is not doing enough to ensure that universities are held to account when they don’t deliver,’’ she said.

“Whether it’s unacceptable completion rates, inadequate courses or poor employment outcomes, students deserve complete transparency.

“Too many students are being left with a massive HECS debt, made worse by Labor’s sky high indexation rate, and very little to show for it.’’