Campus Review - Jun 2013 by Racs Salcedo

WWW.CAMPUSREVIEW.COM.AU | VOL. 23 | ISSUE 6 | JUNE 2013

Election lead-in

A game changer for HE?

Modern job market Is an arts degree still relevant?

Private providers cut into TAFE enrolments

contents EDITOR Antonia Maiolo (02) 9936 8618 antonia.maiolo@apned.com.au

JOURNALIST Aileen Macalintal aileen.macalintal@apned.com.au

PRODUCTION MANAGER Cj Malgo (02) 9936 8772 cj.malgo@apned.com.au

SUBEDITOR Jason Walker (02) 9936 8643 jason.walker@apned.com.au

GRAPHIC DESIGN

SALES James Macauley (02) 9936 8713 james.macauley@apned.com.au Steven Patrick (02) 9936 8661 steven.patrick@apned.com.au (02) 9936 8666 subs@apned.com.au

faculty focus 24 Humanities interest

05 Exam result bans

Why arts remains relevant in the modern job market

Student marks withheld in industrial dispute An inquiry into easing the regulatory burden

07 Recording lectures

Melbourne to trial ‘opt-out’ policy

PUBLISHED BY

MOOCs modify learning landscape

Thirteen Australian universities in the top 100

06 Red tape review

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APN Educational Media (ACN 010 655 446) PO Box 488 Darlinghurst, NSW 1300 ISSN 1037-034X Print post approved: 10001945

08 Recycling buildings

COVER

12 Management awards

VC’s Corner 32 Demand-driven

We profile 2012 ATEM winners

© Copyright. No part of this publication can be used or reproduced in any format without express permission in writing from APN Educational Media. The mention of a product or service, person or company in this publication, does not indicate the publisher’s endorsement. The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent the opinion of the publisher, its agents, company officers or employees.

Striking a balance between academic and professional staff

14 University housing

Craven praises increased participation

VET 34 Lifelong learning

Literacy level low for adults

36 Marketisation

How to accommodate the needs of students

TAFE suffers as private providers take over

policy & reform 16 Pre-election rundown

38 Faster learning

21 NSW government strategies

noticeboard 39 The latest in staff

NZ universities need to get up to speed

Where the parties stand on HE Upton’s incentives for international students

28 Tech talk

SA TAFE commitment to one system

QLD and VIC enrolments up

PUBLISHER’S NOTE

UQ’s turn to offer free courses

TAFE 30 Skillful solution

10 TAFE trends

international education 13 International expertise

technology 27 MOOCs launch

Making the most of new technologies

Renovations resolve budget constraints

Design by Cj Malgo Images Thinkstock

16 22 Digital downfalls

news 04 New uni rankings

Ryan Salcedo ryan.salcedo@apned.com.au

Audited 2,664 September 2012

appointments

more than a room We draw on global expertise to provide quality facilities and exciting student communities

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June 2013 | 3

news

AU universities

head for the top

In the face of “short sighted” funding cuts and a changing education system, Australia’s universities are rapidly emerging as potential world leaders, according to a new university rankings list. By Antonia Maiolo

ustralia has shot up in the latest global universities ranking guide, with more institutions in the top 100 list than any other country except the UK. According to the Times Higher Education’s 100 Under 50 list, Australia has emerged as the second strongest nation behind only the UK, with 13 institutions in the top 100. The Queensland University of Technology has become the top-ranked institution for Australia, jumping from 40th last year to joint 26th. The University of South Australia is another to show significant improvement, rising from 65th to 48th place. While the country loses two from the list – Edith Cowan University and RMIT

University – it gains one with Murdoch University placing joint 57th. The world-wide ranking of 100 universities aged under 50 examined which nations are best positioned to challenge the US and the UK as future higher education powerhouses, with Australian universities providing fierce competition to the traditional elite. Phil Baty, rankings editor and editor at large with London-based THE, said the performance outcome is “good news” for Australia which has shown very promising signs recently. “Australian universities did very well in the 2012-13 World University Rankings, and this dynamic new list shows that Australia has

2014 Fulbright ProFessional scholarshiP in Vocational education and training

The 2nd Annual ATEM/Campus Review 2013 Best Practice Awards in Tertiary Education Management

Sponsored by the Department of Industry, Innovation, Climate Change, Science, Research and Tertiary Education

For 37 years the Association for Tertiary Education Management (ATEM) has been at the forefront of developing, nurturing and encouraging the tertiary education management professional. ATEM has sought to recognise the achievement of our members and to encourage best practice.

Package Valued uP to aud 32,000 This scholarship is for employees within the vocational education and training sector or training leaders in business and industry to undertake a 3-4 month program of research or professional development in the U.S.

In the 2012, ATEM, together with Campus Review, held the first ever best practice awards in tertiary education management. The awards were a great success and we have established what we believe to be a great tradition. In 2013, applications are invited for the 2nd Annual ATEM/Campus Review Awards for Best Practice in Tertiary Education Management.

For further information and applications see www.fulbright.com.au

The ATEM/Campus Review Best Practice awards in tertiary education management seek to recognise best practice and celebrate not only the winners but all who seek to excel in their profession.

applications close 12 august 2013

ATEM once again acknowledges the support of Campus Review, the premier magazine dedicated exclusively to the sector, as the awards main sponsor. Last year, Campus Review’s support was crucial in gaining wide publicity for the awards.

fulbright.com.au 1

4 | June 2013

real strength in the depth and diversity of its higher education system,” Baty said. “There are really positive prospects and great opportunities for Australia, across the sector, especially given its proximity for the growing economies of Asia and its attractiveness to international students.” But Baty said there are clear warning signs for Australia, with no institutions in the top 20 and two representatives having dropped out of the top 100 this year. Although the country has consolidated its positions in the rankings, he warned that Australia risks being left behind if it doesn’t “exploit its strengths and geographical advantages”. Baty said the “short-sighted” funding cuts to the country’s tertiary sector have sent out a distress signal across the higher education world, and that Australia could fail to capitalise on its current strong position in world higher education and research. He said whilst Australian higher education is a victim of austerity, a number of East Asian institutions are providing generous funds to their universities. Twenty-eight countries/ regions were represented in the “horizon-scanning” list of potential higher education leaders compared with 30 last year. n

Categories: u The LH Martin Award for Excellence in Leadership (page 4) u The ResearchMaster Award for Excellence in Research Management (page 5) u The Higher Ed Services Award for Excellence in Financial Management (page 6) u The Dragon NaturallySpeaking Award for Excellence in Innovation (page 7) u The Knowledge Partnership Award for Excellence in Marketing, Communication and Public Relations (page 8) u The Professional Staff Union Award for Excellence in Community Engagement (page 9) u The Global HR Innovation Award for Excellence in Human Resources Management (page 10) u Award for Excellence in Student Administration & Customer Service (page 11) u The Cyon Knowledge Computing Award for Excellence in IT Management (page 12) u The Campus Living Villages Award for Excellence by a Young Person in Tertiary Education (page 13)

news

Union action

withholds

exam results

Student exam results are hostages in the National Tertiary Education Union’s fight for fairer pay and work conditions. By Antonia Maiolo

housands of university students across Victoria won’t get their exam results, thanks to the ongoing pay dispute between staff unions and university management. Teaching staff from Monash and Deakin University are the latest in a long line of academics across the state that are banning the release of students’ assessment marks. RMIT and Swinburne universities were among the first to announce bans on issuing exam results. The National Tertiary Education Union calling for a seven per cent pay increase annually over four years will ban the transmission of results. The NTEU has also imposed a ban on overtime for general staff and a ban on performance appraisal. The union’s industrial organiser for Monash, Stan Rosenthal said, “We are

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doing this because ... our members have indicated that it is time to increase pressure on the employer.” Deakin University staff have also expressed concern that management is looking to reduce working conditions, including reducing overtime payments and weekend penalty rates and reducing the minimum casual hours a person can be employed. Dr Colin Long, NTEU Victorian division secretary, said the union has indicated their willingness to negotiate over their pay claim but that they have not been met with a counter offer. “We’d rather not inconvenience students, but staff has met with management in good faith for eight months and have nothing to show for it. There isn’t even a pay offer on the table.” He said Deakin University is the most profitable university in Victoria and would be able to afford staff pay increases even with the ‘efficiency dividend’ recently imposed by the federal government. Last financial year, Deakin boasted a $60 million surplus, $22 million greater than budgeted, which the vice-chancellor attributed to ‘underspends’ on salaries, research, buildings and ground costs, Long said. But the university’s vice-chancellor,

professor Jane den Hollander said a seven per cent pay rise over four years would cost the university $120 million. “In light of recent budget cuts and slow growth in student enrolments, this is unaffordable,” den Hollander said. She said to accommodate this cost increase would mean “job losses”. RMIT’s refusal to commit to a new staff agreement which includes limits to the number of casual academics has the union imposing similar bans. RMIT branch president Dr Melissa Slee said the union had spent 10 months attempting to negotiate a new collective agreement covering wages and conditions but RMIT continued to stall. “RMIT senior management has refused to even make a pay offer. This delay is unacceptable,” Slee said. According to Slee, around 37 per cent of RMIT’s academic staff is casual – the second highest rate in the sector nationally. The university’s deputy vice-chancellor professor Gill Palmer said the union’s demands are “unrealistic”, amidst declining international student numbers and major cuts to state and federal government funding. The salary boost of seven per cent a year amounts to a 31 per cent increase and would result in increased costs well above projected revenues over four years, Palmer said. She said the unions log of claims amounts to more than 80 items and would cost RMIT at least an additional $240 million over four years. Assessment bans have also left an estimated 55,000 students at Swinburne wondering when they will receive their exam marks from semester one. In a message to staff, Swinburne vice-chancellor Linda Kristjanson said the actions imposed by the union are “disproportionate and unjustified”. Kristjanson said the university is facing financial pressure due to Commonwealth cuts which will take $8 million over the next years and is still reeling from the $35 million funding cut to TAFE last year which saw the closure of Swinburne’s Lilydale and Prahran campuses. NTEU Swinburne branch industrial officer Josh Cullinan said the failure of the vice-chancellor to “treat her staff with respect” has led to the ban. “Even more serious than results bans are lengthy stoppages and strike action which would see students not taught.” Cullinan said graduating students and students experiencing hardship will be exempt from the ban. But it would seem others might be in for a longer wait. Cullinan said, “Whilst the vice-chancellor refuses to treat negotiations seriously, it would appear the lifting of the ban is some way off.” n June 2013 | 5

news

Easing the

burden

Labor’s independent review of university red tape should streamline regulatory requirements. By Antonia Maiolo

ertiary education minister Craig Emerson and minister for higher education Sharon Bird has announced a planned review that will potentially ease the burden of increased reporting and compliance costs to Australian universities. The review will concentrate on maintaining higher education quality and transparency, while minimising red tape under current regulatory and data management arrangements. “Universities have told us that their administrative burden is too great. We take these views seriously and that’s why we’re taking action,” Bird said. The inquiry follows concerns by universities and a recent report by PhillipsKPA which estimated universities spend $280 million a year in meeting reporting requirements of numerous government agencies. The report found that in total universities allocated around 66,000 days of staff time and spent up to $26 million in meeting the 18 sets of Department of Industry, Innovation, Science, Research and Tertiary Education (DIISRTE) reporting requirements in 2011. Emerson and Bird appointed professors Kwong Lee Dow and Valerie Braithwaite to undertake the red-tape review. The reviewers are expected to report back on recommendations for the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency’s approach to regulation, during a period in August. TEQSA issued a statement saying they welcome the review as a way to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the current regulatory system. 6 | June 2013

The national regulator for higher education said the review will reduce duplication in data gathering activities undertaken by TEQSA and other government agencies. However, TEQSA chief commissioner Carol Nicoll has urged critics to provide evidence of any “over-reach” by the agency. Nicoll told a Senate estimates committee that the national regulator accounted for only one per cent of the reporting burden and a process for a streamlined system was already underway. Belinda Robinson, chief executive of universities peak body Universities Australia, which commissioned the report and initially raised concerns over “inefficient” and “wasteful” regulation and reporting, welcomed the federal government’s decision to take action. “We cannot afford to have the sector bound up in heavy-handed, costly and unnecessary red tape where the purpose is unclear, and where it is not immediately apparent that the regulatory principles of risk, proportionality and necessity have been appropriately applied,” Robinson said. Robinson said she supports the need for a properly resourced regulatory framework, but said that “best practice regulation imposes the lowest burden necessary”. She said that this is not the case with the existing regulatory framework for universities. The review will also explore an ‘earned autonomy’ model “where providers with a history of excellence and achievement are largely exempt from reporting requirements”, as well as provide

advice on the need for a wider examination of regulation across the tertiary education system, something UA strongly supports. National Tertiary Education Union national president, Jeannie Rea, said the union is supportive of any measures that would ensure resources are not wasted on costly regulation, especially “given the most recent cuts to university funding”. But Brett Mason, the opposition spokesman for tertiary education, has branded the review as “nothing more than a cheap political stunt”. The Coalition has a deregulation reform taskforce which has been looking at tackling the red tape burden on universities. Mason said the Coalition has been expressing concern about the excessive government reporting for years. “Only now, when an election is mere months away, is Labor bothering to look into it,” Mason said. “This review smacks of a cheap political stunt by a government which is desperately trying to restore some favour with the sector, having recently subjected it to savage cuts of $3.3 billion since October 2012.” The Australian Greens have cautioned that the review to pursue deregulation could come at the expense of accountability. Greens higher education spokesperson Lee Rhiannon is calling for Emerson to guarantee that “only real instances of duplicated data collection and reporting will be scrapped” and that quality teaching and learning reporting requirements will be maintained. n

news

Lectures

on automatic

record

Lecture recordings may yet replace traditional face-to-face learning. By Antonia Maiolo

he number of students logging online for lecture recordings is set to rise at University of Melbourne following the academic board’s unanimous approval of an ‘opt-out’ policy. The decision will see the University run a pilot in two yet-to-beannounced faculties next semester, as a test to ensure that the recording system can cope with the demand. At present, academics can decide to record their lectures or ‘opt-in’ at the beginning of each semester. But under a new arrangement, lectures will be automatically recorded unless a lecturer can give a “good reason” as to why they want to opt out of the service. The University of Melbourne Student Union said the trial has come as a response to student concerns over the availability of lecture recordings. Students who responded to a 2011 survey by the Education Academic Department indicated that they mostly used lecture recordings as exam revision and to catch up on lectures they missed. Only 20 per cent of students nominated that one of the reasons they used lecture recordings was to substitute the attendance of live lectures. The union said lecture recordings provide much needed support and flexibility to students who have timetable conflicts, work and family commitments, as well as being a revision tool for students before end-of-semester exams and those from a nonEnglish-speaking background.

Kara Hadgraft, UMSU president, said the union will ensure that staff members who choose to opt out have legitimate reasons for doing so. Hadgraft said that despite some academics showing strong opposition to the idea, saying that it means student won’t turn up to class, “there are already many academics who have either come on board in support of lecture recordings or have at least accepted the inevitability”. “This is not about encouraging students not to turn up to class, it is about providing an extra resource for those who need or want it,” she said, adding that she doesn’t believe this policy will lead to the university becoming an “off-campus institution”. A spokesperson for the university said this trial will allow them to assess the impact of a more systematic and available form of this type of resource. The university acknowledges that a decline in lecture attendance may be a “risk” and is something the trial will consider. “We will evaluate the trial very carefully, and discuss what we learn with academic staff before seeking academic board approval for any next steps,” the spokesperson said. n

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ANMAC invites nurses and midwives with the knowledge, skills, experience and reputation to assess educational programs. Your input through this important professional role is valuable in helping ensure that the program meets the required standard for registration. ANMAC provides remuneration for participation in assessment team teleconferences and the site visits to the campuses where the education program is delivered.

ANMAC covers all reasonable travel and accommodation expenses where assessments require a site visit. To register with ANMAC as an assessor please complete an Expression of Interest Form available on our website http://anmac.org.au/assessors and return it to ANMAC with a copy of your current Résumé.

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news

Recycling

buildings

In the face of funding cuts, Australian universities can remain on top of their game by maximising what they already own. By Aileen Macalintal

ecycling buildings is a cuttingedge response for universities tightening their budget. After all, many universities have a number of existing buildings that need not be sold or demolished in favour of new infrastructure. David Gulland, principal of international design firm Hassell, said, “Many buildings have heritage significance that is central to the university’s identity, and it would be very costly, wasteful and damaging to the environment to try and replace every building on campus for each new generation of students.” “Through carefully-considered refurbishments, universities have the opportunity to retain their existing building stock while adapting them to create more relevant learning spaces,” Gulland said. “The difference between a refurbishment and a new build can be a saving in the order of $1,000 to $2,000 per square metre in construction cost,” he said. “Universities ... are always looking for opportunities to do more with less.” 8 | June 2013

Currently, the firm is working on the refurbishment of up to 40 teaching spaces across the Curtin University campus at a cost of $15 million over two years. It’s estimated that it would have cost the university $25 million to build from new.

Curtin upgrade

For Curtin University, refurbishment is the most economical and sustainable method to meet not only budget cut issues but also strategies in campus activation and building use. Curtin’s director of project management, Ron Hewitt said, “We have maturing buildings that require upgrading and improvements and at the same time we have rapidly changing pedagogy and a requirement for new technologies to support that, so it made sense to redevelop our existing facilities rather than add to our building stock.” Hewitt said their goal is for more students to use these spaces more often for better learning outcomes. Centrally-allocated teaching spaces at Curtin University are

designed to be flexible spaces for a variety of different learning modes. The university decided to undertake refits, rather than constructing new buildings, as a sustainable strategy. “This presented an opportunity to upgrade existing facilities, both building fabric and technologies at a lesser cost than the construction of new facilities,” he said.

Adelaide refit

Another example of Hassell’s university refurbishment design is the University of Adelaide Learning Hub, a large-scale redevelopment of an unused site on campus. To create the state-of-the-art student hub, adjoining buildings were modified. Paul Duldig, vice-president of services and resources said, “There’s no room for expansion without venturing into the high-cost leasing of city buildings so we need to make the most of every inch of our campus.” Duldig said the student learning hub

Phontos: Sam Noonan

news

made great use of barren space. “We turned a cement plaza, only used as a pathway from one building to another, into a three-level interconnecting student space which has become a benchmark for learning spaces, and buzzes with student activity at all hours of the day and night,” he said. The hub central covers 10,500 square metres over three levels and facilities that include Skype booths, the Maths Learning Centre, the Writing Centre, 11 project rooms, 11 project booths, and student lounges with moveable furniture. There are also information service areas, a student kitchen, training rooms, print stations, lockers, food outlets, convenience store and post office. “We had a vision of providing the best on-campus experience for students in Australia so we brought students into the design process. There was more than 9000 hours of student involvement in both the design and overall function of the space.”

Research-based design

Hewitt said Curtin’s mature building stock required adaption to new pedagogies, and refurbishments at the university show an equal contribution from pedagogy, technology and design in response to contemporary student needs. “A number of universities and institutes have assessed outcomes following change, and in Curtin’s case we have begun to get the feedback from students and staff on the work done in 2012,” he said. Their Teaching and Learning group use feedback in planning forums and project control, for room selection, planning and technology. “The university looks to the best value for money decisions in all projects. These decisions are not just driven by education budget cuts – they make good asset management sense,” he said. In transforming a building, the architecture firm involves the universities in decision-making about what to retain, discard or change. “We meet with the university, walk through their existing

buildings and discuss with their learning and teaching experts which spaces are not reaching their potential,” Gulland said “We observe how the spaces are currently used and may also speak with students and academics about their needs. We then work with the university on what changes these spaces need and how they could be redesigned to meet the expectations of new generations of both students and academics.”

Dimensions

Gulland said many changes are related to technology as they turn buildings into state-of-the-art teaching and research. “This is done through features such as wireless connections and video links, displaying and responding to course work in “real time”, multiple and flexible points of display,” he said. There is also a human dimension to the designs, because consideration is given to natural light and outside views. Through their designs, they also create more opportunities in the space where people can work together flexibly and collaboratively. “Rather than just having a one-size-fits-all approach to teaching spaces, we can also introduce flexible spaces that can be used for different types of teaching and learning, as needed – whether it is collaborative work, quiet study, group learning, private meetings or a large lecture,” he said. He said universities are also looking for ways in which learning and research laboratories can be better integrated. “For instance, the University of Queensland is about to open its Advanced Engineering Building that has multiple labs alongside teaching spaces, and gauges integrated into the fabric of the building so students can observe it, to monitor its performance.” Top universities place a lot of emphasis on pedagogy and the student experience, said Gulland. “Architecture and design can interrogate and interpret these aspirations, and find creative solutions in designing environments that can respond to these challenges.” n

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June 2013 | 9

news

Vocational training numbers

up in Qld

More Year 12 students in Queensland are taking the path of vocational education. By Aileen Macalintal

ueensland has seen an upward trend in the number of senior school students completing VET qualifications, said a spokesperson for Queensland Studies Authority. Of 47,181 students who graduated from Year 12 in Queensland, 30,536 achieved a VET qualification last year, compared to 28,872 (of the 46,136 graduates in 2011) and 26,892 students out of 44,998 graduates the previous year. An increase can also be seen in the number of school-based apprenticeships or traineeships. More than 7000 students were school-based apprentices and trainees in 2012, compared to the 2011 figure of 6508 students. “Prior to this, Year 12 was mainly comprised of students who intended to go to university. These students generally studied traditional academic subjects and were awarded an Overall Position (OP). OPs are used in the selection of students for tertiary education courses,” the spokesperson said. “The majority of Year 12 students now successfully combine an academic range of courses and vocational qualifications, providing options for further education, training and work,” he said. However, he emphasised that changes in vocation training enrolment do not necessarily translate to increase or decrease in university enrolment. “The number of Year 12 students who receive an OP has remained relatively stable over the past 20 years, approximately 26–28,000 students, despite the steady increase in the number of students with VET qualifications.” Another influence on the subjects students take is the introduction of the Queensland Certificate of Education (QCE), an 10 | June 2013

achievement-based certificate awarded to eligible students at the end of Year 12. The QCE recognises a broad range of learning, including VET, workplace and community learning and university subjects undertaken while at school. David Williams, the executive director of Victorian TAFE Association (VTA), said the number of students participating in TAFE and VET in Victoria increased up until the end of 2012, but he said whether the qualifications were achieved is “unclear”. “TAFE in many instances is seen as a better alternative to study and we are finding that with a substantial focus on a combination of the vocational course, with complementary literacy and numeracy support, we are achieving better outcomes than in the past.” TAFE Queensland deputy director-general for Training and Employment, Jodi Schmidt, has also observed the rise in the number of students going to TAFE. “In times of higher unemployment, TAFE typically sees an increase in the number of people choosing to undertake study to improve their employment options. “Queensland has long had the highest number of school-based apprentices and trainees in the country — at the moment, it is sitting at around 47 per cent. “In Queensland more secondary school students are choosing to study TAFE and vocational education and training programs as part of their senior studies than ever before,” she said. She said the proportion of OP-eligible students in Queensland schools has dropped by less than one per cent. “This is not a bad thing, and students aren’t necessarily ‘abandoning’ the OP, but are seeking out qualifications that lead directly to jobs and careers,” she explained, “It just means that there is plenty of choice — and students can make decisions that best suit them.” More pathways are available for students to consider when they complete Year 12, changing the proportion of OP-eligible students, Schmidt said. “Not everyone wants to go to university — and yet there are other pathways to enter into university degrees that may be better suited to some students, such as the vocational education and training path.” Williams said the VTA expects that the number of students participating in TAFE will vary across the state. “We have some early reports from 2013 that enrolments are down by 10 per cent in some TAFEs, while at some others, enrolments are up by nearly eight per cent. “It is unclear until the full impact of changed course government funding subsidy, increased students fees and reduction in diversity of courses offered has its full over 2013,” he explained. He said the full impact of the loss of $170 million in TAFE “full service provider” funding is also unclear, including how it might impact on enrolments and sustainability of some TAFE courses. In terms of changes to Queensland vocational funding, funds will go to areas that will support the state economy, according to Schmidt. “From July 1, 2013, the Queensland government encourage more Queenslanders to undertake a Certificate III qualification through TAFE and selected private providers,” she said. Schmidt said TAFE has been delivering training programs for more than a century now and is Queensland’s largest and most experienced training provider. “As a result of this experience and flexible training delivery methods, TAFE has a high capacity to manage additional student numbers,” she said. TAFE students can complete a short course, a certificate course or a longer diploma program with many programs offering credit towards university level study. “These pathways provide people from all walks of life with an entry into further education be it to develop skills to get a job now or to improve their longer term employment prospects.” n

advertorial 2006 John Monash Scholar Dr Mark Dawson. Image courtesy of the Wellcome Trust

Leading Universities:

Supporting Future Australian Leaders

he General Sir John Monash Foundation was established in 2001 to offer scholarships for international postgraduate study to outstanding young Australians. The annual scholarship program is supported by 10 Australian universities and aims to support future generations of Australian leaders in the vision of Sir John Monash. John Monash Scholarships are a unique Australian award that are now regarded in the same rank as the Rhodes Scholarship (to Oxford) and the Fulbright Scholarship (to the USA). General Sir John Monash is widely recognised as one of the greatest of Australian leaders. Born in 1865 in country Victoria, he was trained as an engineer, and came to prominence as a citizen soldier, leading Australian forces at Gallipoli and in France in the First World War. Commentators and military historians regard him as the finest general of that war. Upon return, Monash was instrumental in the development of the Latrobe Valley coal resources, and the electrification of Victoria. He was also the driving force behind the institution of ANZAC Day and the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne. When he died in 1931, 250,000 mourners attended his funeral. Monash was a passionate believer in education, and served as Vice Chancellor of the University of Melbourne. John Monash Scholars must have outstanding academic records from their Australian university. They must also have demonstrated their leadership capabilities, and involvement in community activities. Around 220 of the best university graduates from around Australia apply

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each year. State selection panels – comprised of business, community, and academic leaders – interview about a third of these, and narrow down to the top twenty, who are interviewed by a National Selection Panel in November. Around 10 John Monash Scholars are announced each year, with certificates awarded by the Governor-General each March. Each Scholar receives A$50,000 per year for up to three years, to study for a Masters or a PhD at a prestigious overseas university of their choice. Since 2004, 83 John Monash Scholars have been elected, and 43 have now completed their courses. Scholarships support study in any field, so the Scholars’ ranks include scientists, doctors, lawyers, writers, philosophers, economists and other disciplines. Their common feature is leadership – and many are already establishing outstanding careers in business, government, or academia. Since late 2011, a group of leading Universities have joined with the General Sir John Monash Foundation to offer an Australian Universities John Monash Scholarship. Each has committed funds, either as an endowment or an annual payment for 10 years, to support a Scholar to be announced each year. The Foundation works each year to raise funds for future Scholarships. Any university interested in joining the Australian Universities John Monash consortium should contact the Foundation’s Chief Executive, Dr Peter Binks, on peter.binks@monashawards.org or telephone 03 9620 2428.

Ms Jessica Mathie

2013 Australian Universities John Monash Scholar

Jessica Mathie is the inaugural Australian Universities’ John Monash Scholar, elected for 2013. Jessica has a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Creative Writing Production) from the Queensland University of Technology as well as a Master of Arts (Advanced Linguistics) from the University of Queensland. She has worked as a Senior Linguist in Port Hedland, Western Australia, for the last three years. Jessica speaks Yinhanwangka, a traditional Aboriginal language of the Pilbara region, and Japanese. Her work addresses the loss of indigenous linguistic diversity in Australia (only 20 of 250 languages are still being passed on to children). Jessica will study for a PhD in Linguistics in Canada. Her research proposal would focus on investigating derivational morphology in Martu Wangka, an endangered Aboriginal language of the Pilbara region of Western Australia with only approximately 700 speakers. One of the important benefits of this work is that it will raise the profile of Australian languages internationally, and encourage more leading scholars to devote their research efforts to our country’s fragile linguistic heritage. Jessica presented at the Australian Linguistic Society Annual Conference in December 2012, and will commence her study in Canada in September 2013. June 2013 | 11

news

Winning ways This month’s winners The Unipromo Award for Excellence in Marketing, Communication and Public Relations Winner: Australian Catholic University

The Unipromo award for Excellence Marketing, Communication and PR award was won by the team led by David Craig at the Australian Catholic University for their 2012 student recruitment campaign entitled “My World is in Full Colour”. The traditional Change of Preference (COP) period in Australia runs from October to January and is a crucial marketing period for Australian Catholic University (ACU). In 2011, the federal government lifted the cap on the number of students that universities could enroll – which also meant universities would no longer receive guaranteed funding for a set number of student places. This change, coupled with the sector-wide decline in international student revenues, created a hugely competitive market for the COP period as universities attempted to top up their student numbers. In addition, ACU had to overcome a competitive disadvantage, being the only Australian university operating nationally. ACU would have to respond with a campaign which was effective at each of its six campuses, with each campus operating in very different environments. With the knowledge that other Australian universities would be operating in this cluttered and highly competitive environment with large budgets, ACU responded with a clever, consistent, innovative and targeted approach for the COP campaign. The aim of the campaign was to demonstrate where a degree from ACU could take you – showing a graduate from each of the university’s five faculties in their workplace. These graduates needed to be real people in real jobs, depicting the ACU Mission to “make a specific contribution to its local, national and international communities”. The tag line for the campaign My World Is… created a personal feeling and tied in the notion of local and global communities. My World also conveyed the concept that for these graduates, their job and career was a vitally important, enjoyable and treasured part of their life. The campaign was successful in meeting and surpassing the set objectives. Applications and commencing enrolments well exceeded the university’s targets. ACU’s market share of applications grew in all of the geographic markets that they compete in and conversion rates increased.

What the judges said

ACU’s entry scored highly in all of the judging criteria and was the clear winner, something that was enhanced by the ‘in-house’ preparation of the entry and supporting documentation and creative material. The entry itself was innovative with its design and presentation, making all information easily accessible and clear. The results achieved were impressive and exceeded the campaign objectives.

The LH Martin Institute award for Leadership Winner: Maddy McMaster

Many of the categories for nomination for the best practice awards are project based achievements. One, however, is more a personal 12 | June 2013

Top: David Craig and his team at ACU receive their award from Peter Castleton, chair of the committee and Meaghan Ford from Unipromo. Bottom: Heather Davis accepts the Leadership award on behalf of Maddy McMaster, with Leo Goedegebuure, from the LH Martin institute and Tom Gregg, chair of the panel.

recognition of achievement in the leadership category. Maddy McMaster is currently the academic registrar at RMIT University but has also worked at the University of Melbourne and the Council of Adult Education. She has demonstrated leadership over a 30-year career in which she has consistently built organisational culture (challenging current thinking, inspiring and motivating, communicating a vision and alignment with institutional goals) and in leading specific projects and process changes. Her leadership is a true example of a person who takes their position seriously and who contributes above and beyond the call.

What the judges said

Maddy impressed as an outstanding leader in her own right. She also accepts a professional responsibility to continue to develop her skills and leadership philosophies, and to communicate the results of her studies and deliberations. She clearly meets her responsibility to develop and guide current and future leaders within her teams through inspirational leadership. Her submission was the one application where every one of the criteria for this award was met, and the only one where the immediate and long-term benefits from her leadership were presented with great clarity. Her leadership turned around a key team at RMIT, caused a change in direction, and brought immediate and long-term benefits to the institution and to all those working with and around her. This was an outstanding result.

ATEM/Campus Review Awards for Best Practice in Tertiary Education Management Deadline for submissions looms

The deadline for submissions of entries for the awards is almost upon us with the deadline for entries to be received by midnight on June 30. This year, the awards ceremony will be held at the iconic and stunning Cascade Brewery site in Hobart on September 16, 2013 as part of the Tertiary Education Management Conference. The location is surrounded by mountains and surrounding gardens and provides a fantastic ambience to allow the celebration of our profession. Go to http://www.atem.org.au/about-us/best-practiceawards for a full explanation of the awards, their philosophy, history and application details. n

international education

Striking the right balance Internal collaboration is the key to successfully implementing an internationalised vision. By Phil Honeywood

nternationalisation in education has many dimensions. At its best it embraces student mobility, transnational education, internationalisation of the curriculum, academic exchange and extensive collaborative research outputs. The federal government’s “Australia in the Asian Century” White Paper recognised the strong push by many of our education institutions to enhance their internationalisation strategies. However, as internationalisation of Australia’s education institutions develops, there is increasing debate regarding the sometimes competing priorities between academic and professional staff. Who are the most appropriate people within an institution to implement the vision? On one hand, Australia’s global leadership in international education owes much to professional staff who have developed specialised skills in establishing partnerships with overseas institutions, recruiting full-fee-paying international students, enhancing the student experience and abiding by complex compliance regulations. On the other hand, as internationalisation becomes more focused on curriculum, research networks and post graduate student mentoring, there is a tendency for institution leaders to rely increasingly on academic staff to implement their internationalisation agenda. At one level, increased academic leadership of international strategy is needed and should be welcomed. However, a number of variables have to be factored into this equation. First, is the institution prepared to provide appropriate incentives or KPIs to ensure that their academic staff will be meaningfully involved in ongoing international engagement? Given teaching loads and heightened research publication expectations, it may not be organisationally possible for some academics to become key players in internationalisation strategies. Institutional self-awareness is sometimes lacking in this regard. Second, academic staff will often have less of a business emphasis and more of a content and teaching and learning focus. While some are very capable in their own right in identifying and bringing back business opportunities, their main area of interest is around development and delivery of their institution’s academic “product”. Professional staff involved in internationalisation can probably best contribute to the identification of international business opportunities and to the design and delivery of successful business strategies. They can also provide the ongoing business support at the implementation stage. Not to be overlooked is the cross institutional memory and overseas networks they can bring to the table. Conversely, professional staff need to understand what drives academic interest, motivation and engagement. www.campusreview.com.au

There needs to be greater understanding of the often complementary skills that academic and professional staff can bring to their institution’s internationalisation strategy. Pooling of responsibilities and expertise to develop a culture of collaboration rather than competition obviously has merit. In order to overcome competing priorities and achieve a partnership approach a number of institution-wide goals should be agreed upon: 1. A greater emphasis within the culture of institutions that success will only be achieved through partnership and co-dependency between academic and professional staff 2. Effective partnerships will most likely be attained through shared design and implementation of the internationalisation strategy, and 3. Joint learning and professional development involving the two groups working together with a practical focus may be required to truly overcome competitive internal barriers. As Australia’s education institution leaders grapple with the need for appropriate internationalisation strategies, they would do well to recognise the need for balance between academic and professional staff expertise. In all of this, providing leadership that endorses the importance of all internal stakeholders will ensure genuine implementation of the institution’s agreed priorities. n Phil Honeywood is executive director of the International Education Association of Australia. June 2013 | 13

international education

New models

in student accommodation

Australia’s unique higher education student profile has driven demand for new models of student accommodation in our capital cities. By Sarah Buckeridge and Geoff Hanmer

n Australia every year, there are about 200,000 international students looking for places to live. This number equates to 30 per cent of higher education students in Australia coming from overseas, compared with less than 10 per cent in the UK, the US, or Canada. By contrast, the vast majority of domestic HE students living away from home go home during at least some of their semester breaks. This pattern of occupation is typical of the accommodation offered by a university college. Despite their many strong points, a college can be a lonely place for an international student to live during holiday periods and the food offerings may not suit international tastes. In Melbourne, international students have driven demand for new forms of student accommodation, including student apartments built for purchase, and managed by private organisations focused on students. Until now, these apartments have been financed by the private sector. Changes in the market since the GFC have made this more difficult, but there are a number of ways that these issues can be overcome. The key elements are: 1. Demand: There are nearly 100,000 international HE students living away from home in Sydney, and about the same number in Melbourne.

14 | June 2013

2. Performance: Studies show that students living near or on a campus in accommodation designed for students perform better than their peers who live off campus. 3. Land: Nearly every university in Australia bar UNSW has land that could be made available to support student housing. UNSW has about 35,000 equivalent full-time student loads (EFTSL) across 35 hectares, or 1000 EFTSL per hectare. The University of Sydney and the University of Melbourne achieve approximately half this intensity. Some suburban campuses, including La Trobe, Monash Clayton and Macquarie, have enormous amounts of under-utilised land. There is plenty of land owned by universities on or near campuses that could support student housing. 4. Safety: Pastoral care, even very basic pastoral care, improves student safety and convenience, provides parents with an increased level of comfort and is something that parents will pay for. Sydney and Melbourne represent the bulk of the international student population, with 70 per cent of international higher education students in Australia attending university in Sydney or Melbourne. The ‘big four’ are, UNSW, the University of Sydney, Monash University and the University of Melbourne. All of these universities have more than 35,000 equivalent full-time

student loads with more than 20 per cent made up of international students (closer to 30 per cent at UNSW). Aleem Nizari, president of the Council of International Students Australia, says that the uncertainty of a new city for international students is compounded by the fact that they do not know where they will live. “Most overseas students find accommodation to be one of the most stressful aspects of their university experience. Shortage of student accommodation has led to substantial increases in rent. This has led students to seek alternative shared housing, often inferior, unsafe and far away from their institution. In most cases, students are not aware of their rental rights and fear to report their landlords for any misconduct,” Nazari said. Many first- and second-year students and parents would prefer a place in some other form of supervised accommodation if it was available. Furthermore, many have money to invest; if they can afford to send their child overseas to study at full fees, they will not be poor. Most university management teams recognise the need to increase student housing provision either on campus or near to campus, and many have tried but, the delivery of major student accommodation projects has proved difficult. In Sydney and Melbourne, for example,

international education

universities provide less than 10 per cent of potential demand; there are fewer than 10,000 university beds in each city. If we consider the demand profile for student accommodation, together with university-owned land, and combine it with developers and architects who understand student housing, thousands of beds could be built in Melbourne and Sydney at a price that many students could afford without any call on university capital. Hayball, an Australian architecture and design firm, has designed approximately 1500 student accommodation units since 2002, under a private development model. This model involves development of self-contained studio units typically ranging in size from 20–25 metres square, which are built by private developers and sold off the plan to investors as managed student accommodation. The use is usually limited by a section 173 agreement, which restricts

occupation to enrolled tertiary students. There are a number of design elements and attributes within the private developments that have contributed to the feasibility of this model and which could be successfully applied to a viable university delivery model. The Canada Hotel project in Carlton close to the University of Melbourne is notable for the spaces it provides for interaction, both planned and organic. The laundry is cast as a social hub, a lecture theatre space caters to gatherings and film events, and a café becomes a shared space. At another student apartment development in Box Hill, each level has a break out zone for shared study with good access to sunlight and co-located with the vertical circulation encouraging incidental meetings and interactions. These spaces do not add significant

extra cost to the development, but take full advantage of place making opportunities within tight spatial parameters. Carefully designed apartment interiors offer reconfigurable spaces while reflecting the role of technology in students’ lives with high level data capability and international cable television. Storage within bathrooms, sliding panels which reveal extra shelving and customised furniture which can create extra storage space opportunities are all important features which increase the functionality of these small spaces. With universities currently providing less than 10 per cent of the required student beds in the major capitals, there remains significant opportunity to apply the lessons learnt from successful design and commercial delivery of high density models to on-campus and near-campus accommodation. n

of topics including social media, de-coding legislation, dynamic delivery modes, and Transnational Education (TNE). With the theme of Global Imperatives, Local Realities, this year’s The AIEC, one of the leading international education AIEC conference will focus on the key challenges faced by educational conferences in the world, provides a platform for like-minded institutions today: How do we promote a sense of global community and passionate delegates from 35 countries to network, whilst still engaging with local priorities? How do we internationalise our share ideas and learn together. Don’t miss this opportunity curriculum? Delegates will hear from a range of highly respected and to better understand what the future holds for this industry in influential keynote speakers, in a range of talks and sessions designed to 2013 and beyond. educate, challenge and inspire. Register now to attend AIEC - National Convention Centre These ideas will also be dissected and discussed by an international panel Canberra - 8-11 October 2013. Register for the conference of key industry experts with a set of thought provoking pre-conference before 5 July to receive the $200 early bird rate. workshops on Tuesday 8 October 2013. These workshops cover a range www.aiec.idp.com

AIEC 2013 Pre-conference Workshops Announced!

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June 2013 | 15

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policy & reform

Where are the higher education policies? The lack of tertiary education policy announcements from the major parties as campaigning gathers pace is hardly new. But the Opposition’s support of what Labor has already done is unusual. By Fran Molloy

16 | June 2013

s September’s federal election draws near, it’s apparent that national higher education policy offerings from both major political parties will be affected by Australia’s straitened fiscal circumstances. Unlike the schools sector, where sweeping reform and substantial additional funding has been promised by both parties, tertiary education has received little attention in political rhetoric so far. Labor’s policy offerings have thus far been overshadowed by continuing strong reactions to cuts announced earlier this year. Tertiary education minister Craig Emerson announced cuts of $2.8 billion to the sector in April. So-called “efficiency dividend” cuts of two per cent start in January next year with a further 1.25 per cent cut occurring in 2015. Meanwhile up-front and early payment HECS discounts will be axed and Student Start-up Scholarships converted from grants to loans.

Continued support for HE targets

However, a spokesperson for minister Emerson pointed out that under this government, university funding has increased substantially and says that rather than cuts, Labor is introducing a ‘reduced rate’ of growth. Labor has completed a three-year transition to a deregulated model of higher education, as recommended by the 2009 Bradley Review of Higher Education. Enrolment caps have been removed and all funding now changed from being per-place offered in a course to per-student enrolled in the course, part of a policy to have universities meet national participation targets. “Labor is opening the gates of our universities to many more young people, including thousands who are the first in their families ever to go to university,” said the spokesperson for Emerson. “University funding has grown by 50 per cent since Labor came to government and

policy & reform will continue to grow over the next three years – just at a slightly reduced rate. That is a big difference to cuts.” Despite speculation to the contrary, the Coalition has supported the removal of place-caps in universities. Brett Mason is the shadow minister for universities and research and a Liberal senator for Queensland. He says, “The Coalition supported key Bradley recommendations such as the uncapping of student places (subject always to the maintenance of standards and quality) and the development of TEQSA.” The Tertiary Education Quality Standards Agency (TEQSA) is an independent national regulatory body for Tertiary education established by the Labor government following the 2009 Bradley Review of Australian Higher Education.

Under-investment

Neither major party appears to be offering much relief from long-term underinvestment in tertiary education, according to professor Sandra Harding, the chair of Universities Australia. Harding says that a key message in Opposition leader Tony Abbott’s keynote address to the Universities Australia conference in February was that his party could not offer more than funding to “maintain the status quo,” should the election deliver a change in government. “Trouble is, none of us knew then that the ‘status quo’ was going to be something very different,” she added, referring to the government’s cuts announced in April. While OECD countries on average have grown public investment in universities by 62 per cent between 1995 and 2009,

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Australia’s investment only grew by 17 per cent, according to Universities Australia. The federal government’s National Plan for School Improvement, recommended by the Gonski review of school education, has come at a significant cost to higher education, with the $2.8 billion cuts to the sector directly attributed to the Gonski reforms. Opposition leader Tony Abbott was scathing about the cuts in a sector that had already been hit hard. “This is on top of the $3.9 billion worth of cuts to education that the government announced in the mid-year economic and fiscal outlook statement towards the end of last year,” he said. “The only way to get the investment we need in education and disability services is to build a stronger economy.” However, despite the rhetoric, cuts to university funding have bipartisan support, with no indication from the opposition that they will reverse the decision should they attain government. “The recent cuts to higher education funding in order to fund school reforms are the result of a panicked and flailing government,” says senator Brett Mason. “If elected, we will need to carefully consider the totality of the recent budget and the totality of the fiscal crisis that the government has bequeathed to Australia.” This is a scene-setting statement, suggesting there’s unlikely to be much more money for higher education under a Coalition government.

Promises of extra money

Despite deep cuts to the sector in April, Labor did deliver some hope in the May 2013 budget, with an additional $186 million over two years for a range of

nationally significant research facilities and a further $135 million toward the Future Fellowships program. An additional $346 million has been budgeted for undergraduate university places and another $84.6 million over four years for more postgraduate and diploma places. The additional funding, meant to assist institutions to supply additional student places, will be allocated on a lower level of base funding per student to universities. “In an ideal world where there were no fiscal constraints, these measures wouldn’t be necessary. Finding some modest savings will be up to the individual universities,” a spokesperson for minister Emerson said.

Full-fee-paying places

Jeannie Rae, president of the National Tertiary education union, has called for more detail on policy on the issue of fee paying domestic university places from the opposition. “We don’t have any clarity around their views on going back to what they did last time on deregulating fees and allowing universities to charge domestic students fees,” she says. “We remain really concerned about that and we want to see something a bit more categorical about where the money is going to come from and who is going to be paying.” However Andrew Norton, who is program director of higher education at the Grattan Institute, says that neither the Coalition nor the ALP supports full feepaying places. “Labor abolished full-fee paying university places in 2009

June 2013 | 17

policy & reform and does not support its reintroduction,” says a spokesperson for the tertiary education minister Craig Emerson. Norton says that the Coalition has backed away from earlier reports that it would seek to reintroduce a cap on student places. Senator Mason confirmed this: “Shadow education minister Christopher Pyne confirmed last year that the Coalition had no plans to recap the system, subject always to the maintenance of quality and standards,” he says. “In an uncapped system, there is really no scope for domestic full-fee-paying positions.” Norton says that because there are more places available generally, the demand for fee-paying places would be quite low. “Even if they did – it’s probably not all that much money in my view,” he says. “It would be clearly a case where the political costs would outweigh the benefits to the universities and the students.”

Up in the air

The Bradley Review in 2008 initiated major structural change to the higher education sector, and after six years in government, future higher education policy directions for Labor are likely to involve a little tweaking around the edges rather than substantial reform. A spokesperson for Emerson said, “Labor’s election policies will be outlined later in the year.

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However, the government has already announced that it will reduce the burden of reporting requirements for universities.” Labor announced an independent review of university regulatory requirements on May 29, with recommendations due in August – a policy likely to have full support from the Opposition, albeit through gritted teeth; cutting red tape in higher education was announced as Coalition policy in April. A submission from Universities Australia to the Deregulation Taskforce established by Tony Abbott in November 2012 estimated costs of $280 million a year in meeting the regulatory requirements of around a hundred separate state and federal laws. In April, Mason announced that Coalition policy would address overregulation in higher education. “Cutting needless red tape in the higher education sector can provide an immediate boost to the budgets and productivity of every university and higher education institution – that means more money freed up in university budgets to fund research, invest in infrastructure and support students,” he said. “The Coalition is determined to cut $1 billion a year in red tape and we want to see these benefits right across the economy.” However, with Labor since coming along and making the policy its own, it is not surprising that the Coalition has slowed down its policy releases. Mason says, “The Coalition is currently in the midst of a policy development process. The Our

policy & reform Plan: Real Solutions for all Australians document is a culmination of high level objectives guiding this process.” Mason says final policies will be made public “in time for the September 14 election”.

Not a lot between them

Norton says that at this stage, it is hard for those in the tertiary education sector to work out which government will deliver them the best policy. “At the moment you would have to say, there are more similarities than differences,” Norton says. The ‘New Colombo’ plan to encourage student exchange in Asia, announced by the Coalition in February, is not yet costed, but by April, the Gillard government had announced more funds towards the AsiaBound program, now worth about $58 million. “The idea of sending Australia’s brightest students to Asia as well as receiving Asia’s brightest students in Australia was initially voiced by the shadow minister for foreign affairs, Julie Bishop. The Coalition was responsible for developing the concept,” Mason says. Norton says that there’s little else “new” on offer from the Coalition at this stage.

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“Tony Abbott turned up to the Universities Australia conference in February, and said essentially that he liked universities but he couldn’t really give them any money. Instead he was promising stability – I think along the line of the ‘stability after chaos’ theme that he is applying generally.” Norton says that the Opposition has backed the cuts announced in April along with other key policies. “The Opposition is publicly supporting the two most important things that Labor has done in higher education while it has been in power,” Norton says. “The really big things that Labor has done in this government are the demand-driven funding system – which the Coalition is broadly supporting while making some nervous noises about the increased number of low ATAR students who are getting in as a result,” says Norton. “And the other big thing that they have done is establish TEQSA, the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency.” Norton says that TEQSA has revolutionised the way that universities are regulated – and also has Opposition support, however the rhetoric from the two major parties around red tape.

June 2013 | 19

policy & reform

Vice-chancellors respond to cuts Sydney University vice-chancellor Dr Michael Spence: “Although the government has lifted overall sector funding since 2007, growth is mostly due to thousands of extra students in the system after restrictions were lifted on undergraduate enrolments. Detailed Group of Eight analysis shows core funding levels per student have declined in real terms. “Applying an efficiency dividend will further reduce the value of funding and could see universities lowering entry standards to enrol even more Commonwealth-supported students. This could seriously impact quality teaching and research. This impact will be felt disproportionately by universities that offer chronically underfunded disciplines such as medicine, veterinary science, agriculture and dentistry.” Australian National University vice-chancellor professor Ian Young: “The cuts will have a significant impact on the whole sector, but they will hit ANU particularly hard because, as the most research-intensive university in the nation, we cannot simply enrol more undergraduate students as many larger universities may do to cover shortfalls. We’ve calculated the impacts of the efficiency dividend combined with the cuts announced in October last year for ANU as $23 million in 2014 and $28 million in 2015. This is a significant challenge and one we are working through with our staff and students to address while we maintain the quality of our research and education.” Melbourne University vice-chancellor professor Glyn Davis: “As a result of the funding cuts announced in April, Australian universities, which have been encouraged to expand enrolments to enable greater access to higher education, will suffer severe financial strain. They will also find it difficult to perform to the high educational standards the community and government have come to expect. “Universities, which already operate under stretched budgets, will struggle to deliver the high standards of education and research the community rightfully expects of the sector. Since the announcement, universities across the country have no doubt been examining their budgets carefully to determine how to accommodate these cuts, and though each university will respond in different ways, all will be affected.” Griffith University vice-chancellor professor Ian O'Connor: “The federal budget cuts are a critical hit to higher education in Australia. Griffith University is currently assessing how they will impact locally. “The total budget cuts will cost Griffith between $20 million and $25 million over the next two years (2014–15). It is not possible to take that amount of money out of the university budget and not have some impact. “But we are looking at every avenue possible across the university to see where we can improve efficiency and make savings while ensuring Griffith's continued growth in research excellence, campus facilities and international standing remain on their current upward trajectory.” 20 | June 2013

University of Adelaide vice-chancellor and president, professor Warren Bebbington: “The cumulative effect of the cuts over the past 12 months may lead some universities to take on more and more weaker students in an attempt to claw back precious income. The danger here is that the overall quality of the sector may be eroded as standards are compromised through uncontrolled growth. “Most telling is the lack of a serious review of the effectiveness or otherwise of the three-year-old demand-driven policies. That is what is really needed to address the inherent dangers of the system, and to generate the kind of focus and support that will drive quality innovation across the country.” University of Western Australia vicechancellor, professor Paul Johnson: “The federal budget included the previously announced cutbacks to the sector including the efficiency dividend, the loss of a range of student income support measures and a cap on tax deductions for self-incurred education expenses. “There were some new spending initiatives, including additional funds for research infrastructure and a continuation of the Future Fellowships program, These will be positive for the sector, but fall a long way short of off-setting the cuts. “The cuts confirmed in the budget, together with the $1 billion reduction in research funding announced in the latter part of last year, will have a major impact on all universities, particularly those that are heavily engaged in research. In addition, all Western Australian universities will be affected by a decline in undergraduate entrants in 2015 – the result of a decision taken twelve years previously to raise the school leaving age by six months.” University of Tasmania vice-chancellor, professor Peter Rathjen: “As a regional university and the only university in the state, UTAS has a broad mandate to cover the spectrum of higher education, from access and pathway programs to research of international importance. The budget did hold welcome aspects, including funding for Antarctic and marine research, VET funding for national teaching programs at the Australian Maritime College and funding to support more university places, Future Fellowships and research infrastructure. Despite the cuts, our university is committed to providing an excellent education experience for our students and to providing a world-class university for Tasmania.”n

policy & reform

The NSW

international

education strategy The New South Wales parliamentary secretary Gabrielle Upton outlines the policies of the state government on international education.

know from my own time as an international student that it can be a challenging and hugely rewarding experience. I did my MBA at the Stern School of Business at New York University. I learnt so much – not only about finance and management but about New York City, the United States and different ways of thinking and doing things. At times it was hard getting ahead in such a chaotic and competitive city, but those challenges were made easier by new friends and professional networks and amazing life experiences. In NSW, we have been listening hard to students and to the sector about what we can do to limit the challenges and boost the rewards for international students and help better position our state as Australia’s number one choice for international study.

Our action plan

Last year, the government brought together a wide range of stakeholders from the NSW international education sector to develop an action plan, a roadmap for sustainable growth over the next ten years. There is no doubt international education has an absolutely critical role to play in NSW’s successful international engagement with the global economy. Education is our state’s second biggest export, worth billion of dollars a year. Equally important is that international students help us to build a greater understanding of the countries and cultures from which they come. I know that from my personal experience. They connect us with the world and help build our state’s reputation as a vibrant multicultural location. We also want international students to learn about NSW and Australia and how we think and do things. It is the exchange of “know-how” that benefits us all. In our discussions with education providers and students, we identified www.campusreview.com.au

actions government and the sector can take to make a difference to our international education experience – key among them were more coordinated promotion and policy and working more closely together to improve the quality of the student experience. NSW is already home to world-class universities, vocational institutions and research organisations, and enjoys a strong global reputation for internationally respected qualifications, high-quality research and teaching and a safe study environment.

One-stop shop

We are working very closely with our education providers and research institutions to develop these strengths further. For example, the government is now working with institutions to develop options for a new one-stop-shop to make the processes around international education easier for students and other stakeholders to navigate. This new one-stop-shop will be a true partnership between government and institutional stakeholders, and a more effective way for all providers to work together to better coordinate promotion, marketing and policy development for international education in NSW. The NSW government is also committed to making NSW institutions attractive destinations for international students to study and experience.

Acting on travel concessions

The one thing that all stakeholders have consistently and frequently offered up as a way to boost our international education experience was student travel concessions. We heard that message and acted on it. In October 2012, discounted long-term MyMulti passes were made available to assist international students with travel costs while studying. To date, over 3,000

tickets have been sold, with the quarterly products being the most popular. The passes provide discounts of between 24 and 35 per cent off adult ticket prices, and offer unlimited travel on buses, light rail, most ferries and – depending on the pass – train services in Greater Sydney, the Hunter and Illawarra. This is an initiative still in its early days and the government is listening to feedback from institutions and students to make sure the process is as valuable, simple and easy to use as possible. Transport for NSW is working closely with tertiary institutions and international student representatives on an ongoing basis to fine-tune the scheme and a working group has been established to manage feedback and suggestions about potential improvements.

Streamlining visas and work access

The government is also working closely with the Commonwealth government to make it easier for international students to study in Australia, through more simplified visa processing arrangements for universities, introduced in April 2012. In addition, we are pursuing greater opportunities for international students to stay and work for a period of time in Australia after they complete their studies. New post-study work rights have been agreed for students coming to study degrees at Australia’s universities and privately-owned higher education institutions. We are working with other states in Australia to encourage the commonwealth government to allow the same choices for students studying diplomas at TAFE and privately-owned institutions.

The approach

International students already see NSW as one of the best places in the world in which to gain a high-quality education, but competition in the sector is fierce, not just from other states but from other countries around the world. We need to take a fresh approach. By working hand-in-hand, the sector and NSW government can make a huge and positive impact to our international education experience. I want to thank all the stakeholders for their willingness to positively contribute to our effort to make NSW the number-one location for international study. n Gabrielle Upton MP is the NSW parliamentary secretary for Tertiary Education and Skills. June 2013 | 21

policy & reform

MOOCs,

money and

casual staff

In the ongoing debate about whether massive open online courses (MOOCs) are the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;game changerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; for universities, the consequences for the academic profession and university jobs are largely overlooked. By Jeannie Rea.

he confluence of the massification of higher education with the ongoing decline in the proportion of direct government funding to public universities and universities ready acceptance of the neo-liberal management model frames the approach to the adoption of digital technologies in university teaching. In just ten years, the proportion of university staff in continuing positions has dropped by 10 per cent, which means that today just over one third of employees are in ongoing positions. 22 | June 2013

Since 2000, casual employment has increased by more than 50 per cent. The bald reality is that university managements now see their workforce as dispensable and readily replaceable. They adopt strategies which try to reduce the proportion of total income spent on wages and salaries through redundancies, subcontracting and outsourcing. The most visible manifestation is the casualisation of teaching where now upwards of 80,000 sessionally employed lecturers and tutors are responsible for more than half of university teaching.

The responsibility for course development and coordination is now resting on the shoulders of fewer and fewer tenured staff. In this context, it is not at all surprising that digital technology in teaching is constantly seen, by management and staff alike, through a lens of cost cutting. The lack of preparedness of most universities to take the initiative in sustainable workforce planning led the NTEU to propose, in the current round of enterprise bargaining, the creation of new, ongoing entry-level positions that would be teaching focused for at least the first three years. This proposal was developed in recognition of the need for urgent action to both create new secure jobs for the next generation of academics, and to maintain educational quality in the face of the ongoing gap in the base funding of government-supported student places.

policy & reform

Unfortunately, despite the increased magnitude of funding by the current Labor government with one-third more students since 2007, the latest funding cuts, implemented as 3.25 per cent efficiency dividend on university block grants, mean that direct funding per student will fall as students HECS debts rise and international students are relied upon to make up the income shortfall. Commonwealth funding now accounts for about 40 per cent of income compared to over 90 per cent in the early 1980s when the Whitlam government’s tuition fee abolition cut in and initially applied to all domestic and international students, including both Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott. The decline of direct government funding and the rise in casual academic employment is not unique to Australia and is also important in understanding the www.campusreview.com.au

consternation over MOOCs in the United States. They emerged last year in an environment of uncontrollable student fees and debt, reduced graduate employment and the tailing off of university enrolments. Arrangements to pay for MOOC accreditation to bypass admissions barriers or replace subjects within a course are rapidly evolving into a viable business model. Coursera, a for-profit company, is now recasting itself as a platform for credit bearing courses. The MOOCs are the latest intervention in what is already a sophisticated online education market, which has already stripped away not just academic jobs, but the autonomy and integrity of academic production. The US university system has always had a two-tier system of tenured academics and ‘adjunct professors’, which is just a flasher name for precariously employed academics working from one semester to the next with little chance of continuing employment. The casualised academic workforce is even further divided with some tutors employed to teach classes, others to assess, and another group to interact with students online. There is a separate profession of academic advisers. Others develop and maintain online courses. They are also probably doing the unacknowledged work on the MOOCs fronted by the “celebrity” professor. Technology is not responsible for the current moment of crisis in university teaching and employment, it is those with decision making power in higher education who have forgotten that education is not a commodity and universities are not just large corporate enterprises. The MOOCs excite interest because they are currently, as their name implies, free for anyone to access. MOOCs are not produced for free and are generally developed by tenured, experienced and highly-regarded academics with the support of their universities in developing these initiatives. This is indeed part of a university’s responsibility – providing opportunities for academics to experiment in teaching and research in the public interest and for the public good. If Australian universities want to establish MOOCs, they need to acknowledge this requires the dedication of substantial resources. Many academics would jump at the opportunity to develop a MOOC, but would be more reluctant if it is was at the expense of re-allocating learning and teaching resources especially if this resulted in further running down of the status of university teaching and the quality for students. Whenever securely employed academics have the opportunity to undertake new learning and teaching initiatives, their

normal teaching duties are usually handed on to other colleagues or casuals. The reality is that casually employed lecturers and tutors do not have a career path or the institutional support to offer the same level of service to the students. Is such a model sustainable when the expectation is that students will be in continuous interaction with their tutors via learning platforms, email and even Facebook. We now have a system dependent on what is effectively ‘volunteer’ work by committed casual academics. At the same time, continuing staff struggle with unmanageable workloads as well as adapting to ever changing policies, technologies and student expectations. Over the past twenty years, academics have largely met the challenge of adapting new technology to change their teaching to cater for larger and more diverse student cohorts in varying settings in and outside the traditional classroom. They have also enthusiastically created and chosen new content drawing upon the vast resources available through digital communication interfaces. Making judicious choices based on their expertise about the content and pedagogy is what academics are expected to do. While once this meant choosing the textbook or readings that were most appropriate, today this may mean getting students to download a lecture from elsewhere and then using class time to add their own content. However, it is not at all surprising that university staff view vice-chancellors’ enthusiasm for MOOCs, flipped classrooms, ‘the cloud’ and an ‘iPad for all’ with suspicion that they may be motivated by reducing costs by replacing ongoing positions with more insecure jobs. While it might seem appealing to download a lecture from Harvard or MIT and asking a (casual) tutor to add local content and perspective, it is going too far when we start to refer to tutors as ‘coaches’ apparently instructing from the sidelines, or even ‘parademics’ (no doubt administering educational first-aid for struggling students). Seeing their workforces as dispensable and interchangeable will not set them up for a digital revolution in higher education learning and teaching. Governments also need to disaggregate their visions for online education from cost savings measures. The strength of the Australian public university system is that there is a consistency of quality across all universities. In order to maintain this reputation they need to look hard at their workforce planning and practices. n Jeannie Rea is the national president of the National Tertiary Education Union. June 2013 | 23

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faculty focus

The relevance of the

liberal

arts

In a tough economic climate, the market worth of a humanities education can be undervalued, but experts argue that an arts education is invaluable and relevant to contemporary society. By Antonia Maiolo

espite weaker job prospects for humanities graduates, thousands of people are still flocking towards an education in the arts as experts argue that a degree in humanities is still a worthwhile investment. The University of Sydney’s faculty of arts has seen a steady increase in the number of enrolments over the years. Enrolment figures rose from 1708 in 2011 to 1946 in 2013, across all faculty degrees. Duncan Ivison, dean of Sydney University’s Faculty of Arts said the arts, humanities and social sciences disciplines are still providing the skills employers are looking for. “I know that employers are increasingly looking for graduates who are well-rounded, can communicate effectively, are able to keep learning and understand things in context, work well in groups and possess really good analytical and research skills,” Ivison said. “Good liberal arts degrees can provide these skills.” He said the key skills liberal arts graduates learn also include critical thinking, empathy, context sensitivity, intellectually breadth, analytical reasoning, and flexibility. “Ideally they have also had the opportunity to hone their creativity and imagination – two things all employers value enormously.” Ivison said that around 60 per cent of their graduates will return to do some kind of postgraduate degree, but said that this figure was not surprising for a variety of reasons including the pursuit of a clear vocational and professional career path. “Coming back to university after working for a period of time means you are more focused and able to identify the key pathways for further study,” he said. He said although postgraduate study is becoming increasingly popular it is not absolutely necessary. Ivison said he has had very prominent CEOs tell him they would rather hire someone who has spent three years “struggling with Chaucer” than someone who has completed an accounting degree. “It also turns out that people who care about these things turn out to be the kind of people you want to hire and work with.” The employment numbers, though, are not encouraging. Several workforce surveys looking at post-study outcomes from a range of degrees show limited employment opportunities for those with an arts degree on its own. Census data on employment outcomes for graduates with a bachelor degree only reveal that just over half of humanities graduates are in professional or managerial roles. This is much lower than occupational focused professions, and lower than for science, the other ‘generalist’ degree.

24 | June 2013

faculty focus A survey by the Australian Bureau of Statistics, where arts and humanities came under the broad ‘society and culture’ category, found nearly 40 per cent of people who report this degree as their highest qualification also have another non-school qualification. The Learning and Work survey 2010–11 also showed that 43 per cent of people with a bachelor society and culture degree report another university degree as their highest qualification. Grattan Institute higher education expert Andrew Norton said “these results are consistent with the hypothesis that typically people who do arts degrees are aware that further study is often necessary for employment”. Norton said that the relatively poor employment prospects translate into significantly lower lifetime income, especially for men. The Grattan Institute estimates the median income for a male humanities bachelor degree graduate over the period of his working life is approximately $1.9 million, only $200,000 more than males who finished education at the end of Year 12. Looking at all males with bachelor degrees, a graduate in the middle of the income distribution is estimated to earn about $2.6 million over his working life. “Someone whose primary motivation in attending university is to get a job or a high income should avoid the humanities if they can,” Norton said. While many humanities graduates do have good jobs and incomes, the risk of not achieving that outcome is significantly higher than for other degrees, he said. Despite the low number of jobs where a humanities education would be ideal, Norton said “degrees in any field can be a signal to employers that the person is intelligent and has a persistence to complete a degree”. Bruce Guthrie policy advisor at Graduate Careers Australia (GCA) said that although the rate at which humanities graduates enter the workforce is slower than for other degrees the skills acquired from an arts program remain relevant to the workforce. The results from GCA’s graduate statistics publication show the employment rate for humanities and related graduates four months after finishing their degree tends to be lower than graduates of other, more occupation-specific degrees. Guthrie said this may be due to the fact that a tighter labour market is still reeling from the global economic downturn and is something that is affecting graduates across the board. “It’s certainly an area where people tend to take longer to find work … but it’s also a degree which would’ve fallen out of www.campusreview.com.au

favour many years ago, if humanities graduates weren’t enjoying success in the field,” he said. Guthrie said employers appreciate the ability of those graduates to “turn their minds to problems” and not be restricted by the theories they studied at university if they had done a more occupationally focused degree. He said employers generally understand the value of a humanities graduate in that they have the ability to think critically and are capable of working in a broad range of areas. “Whereas your dentists and engineers and medicos have a specific set of skills for a specific workplace, humanities graduates tend to be more adaptable. “In some ways, humanities graduates are almost a blank page waiting to be written on by the labour market; I say a blank page

in terms of what they have to offer,” he said. He said an employer hiring a humanities graduate is hiring a lot of potential, which they can then point in the right direction with perhaps further study and training. Head of recruitment strategy at Westpac, Charlie Milne, said their graduate program accepts people from all different types of degrees and that variety in skill and qualification is what influences the hiring process. “We as an organisation are passionate about diversity and so we think that if we are able to secure individuals from a variety of backgrounds in terms of studies that that will actually help to strengthen us as an organisation,” Milne said. She said they will consider a humanities background for those more technical roles where there may be a preference for a particularly unique or specific degree. June 2013 | 25

faculty focus In recognising the unique benefits of an arts program and the need to provide students with skills necessary for a contemporary workplace, the University of Melbourne set up the Executive Master of Arts (EMA). This graduate program which is the first of its kind in Australia covers areas such as professional communication, leadership, people management, financial management and budgeting, and project management methodology. Now in its third year, the EMA is building upon the popular arts degree that the University offers as an undergraduate program. Associate professor Tim Lynch from the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences said the EMA is the answer to a commonly perceived concern that the arts and humanities do not offer students a clear career track. “The humanities degree 500 years ago, the notion of studying art and literature was a gateway to the enrichment of the soul and becoming a better human being. In the modern era, we see that in some way as ‘airy-fairy’ or it’s done by a student who can’t decide what they want to do in life. Now I categorically reject that caricature,” Lynch said. But Lynch said the EMA is a way of correcting that “caricature” and which aims to turn arts-based graduates into social entrepreneurs. He said the EMA is about making arts graduates more marketable, savvy individuals by equipping them with practical skills, than perhaps an arts degree was thought as being able to do in the past. “My hope is psychologically to offer to arts students a confidence that they can compete in a market which is seemingly dominated by people trained in something specific and narrow,” Lynch said. n

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26 | June 2013

technology

UQ to offer

free online courses

Fast broadband, cheap mobile devices, and the digital environment have created ‘massive open online courses’. By Aileen Macalintal

www.campusreview.com.au

University of Queensland

hese free courses have been the universities’ way of adapting to today’s technology and learning styles around the world. In Australia, the University of Queensland will soon be offering MOOCs as they join the edX consortium, a not-for-profit enterprise run by global institutions. This network of the world’s top universities brings learning to everyone, regardless of location or social status. It uses game-like experiences and research on an open source platform. Professor Debbie Terry, UQ senior deputy vice-chancellor, agreed that there is a fundamental change underway in higher education, caused by technological innovation of the times. “We’ve got three things coming together at the moment: you have high speed networks, which have sufficient bandwidth for these courses to be a reality. Most of us now have mobile devices, and our students are what you would call ‘digital natives’ – they are used to accessing materials (with these devices).” UQ is one of the 15 global educational institutions that recently joined the consortium founded by Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. EdX’s expansion brings the total of institutions to 27, which already include Berkeley, Rice and the Australian National University. Right now, edX has more than 900,000 individuals on board. Terry said enrolment in the UQ online courses will have no prerequisites. “These courses are open to students wherever they are. They just need to have the devices and the capacity to access the technology, but they are free online.” The online platform offers innovative opportunities, different from a traditional lecture course. Courses may include a 10-minute study of the material, followed by quizzes, exercise, and interaction with others enrolled on the course. To complete an entire course and receive

a certification, students need to go through all the assessments. Asked whether universities will become a thing of the past, Terry said universities have been evolving since the 12th century and they will adapt. “They survived the advent of the book and the printing press, both of which were suggested to be the end of universities,” she said. Terry said it’s not worth taking the risk that UQ would be wrong in acknowledging major changes in higher education, as seen in a number of companies that have failed to engage with the disruptive impact of technological innovation. “The other partners in edX are an incredibly strong group of universities. We believe that our partnership will contribute to even stronger relationships with those other partner institutions. “But what particularly attracted us to edX,” she said, “is that they are very committed to building a very strong platform for the delivery of these courses.” She explained that edX will help them understand learning and enhance the education system not only in the universities but also in schools. MOOCs provide access to “learning analytics”, or data that includes how students interact with the course material, which information they find useful, or which ones they skim over. “You’ll be able to see how students with different background

interact with the material. Learning analytics is absolutely the way of the future,” said Terry. Starting May 2014, UQ will offer free courses from four leading academics: Hypersonics – from shock waves to scramjets with professor David Mee, Tropical coastal ecosystems with professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, Biomedical imaging with professor Graham Galloway, and The science of everyday thinking with Dr Jason Tangen. Australian National University has already adopted a successful MOOCs model. ANU’s Dr Paul Francis, who teaches the ANU edX MOOC on Astrophysics with Nobel prize winner Dr Brian Schmidt, sees the free online course as an experiment. “We don’t think that anyone really knows where this is all going and how best to do this.” Francis said. “We see ANU’s involvement partially as risk mitigation, and partially as an opportunity to build expertise in the technologies and pedagogies involved,” he said. “We are both experimental scientists and feel that the only way to see how this will all pan out is to get involved and try it.” He took an interest in teaching the online course upon realising that students perceive the online learning as more valuable, and that they “were achieving demonstrably better learning outcomes than the much more expensive face-to-face parts of the course”. n June 2013 | 27

technology

The big disruption

How to make the most of the opportunities offered by new and emerging technologies within a changing Australian university environment. By Rob Livingstone

he perfect storm of cost cuts, austerity, the seduction of new and emerging technologies as well as open learning platforms are creating expectations that universities are on the cusp of a tertiary education disruption, the magnitude of which has not been seen for a thousand years. That may or may not be the case in the long term, however in the here-andnow, for universities coming to grips with innovative, new and emerging technologies that are seen as disruptive, there are a range of challenges that universities face in making a successful transition to a new business model. In my view, the current ‘perfect storm’ is fuelled by a combination of forces: • The first, and most influential of these forces in my view, is the increase uncertainty and volatility facing all Australian organisations, whether public, private or government, university sector included. This tends to result in executive 28 | June 2013

decision making which is biased towards short term demands. Proposed federal funding cuts are set to accelerate this influence sharply. • The second influence is the fundamental shift in the expectations of university IT departments by faculties, executives and students alike. This is often a direct consequence of having first-hand exposure to user-friendly, low-cost (or free) consumer-grade IT technologies and solutions, not to mention appealing and pervasive marketing from IT vendors as well as persistent and enthusiastic appeals from technology evangelists to adopt a specific solution. • The third is that there is most universities have a significant tail of legacy IT infrastructure that still needs to be supported which hampers institutionwide agility in the short term. Many of these large legacy systems contain mission critical transactional data on which a university depends.

Reconfiguring or upgrading these systems is anything but low cost, trivial or risk free. • The MOOC road show. MOOC evangelists are promoting this delivery model as the next big thing in tertiary education. It should be recognised that MOOCs are very much a “work in progress”. One key metric in all formal education is the completion rates for courses. The completion rates (when published) of MOOCs is low. Those serious about delivering a challenging, rich and multi-modal learning experience recognise that MOOCs and other learning modalities will form an important supplement to the overall education experience. The 100 per cent MOOCtrained doctor is unlikely to become a reality.

The digital democracy

The digital democracy is indeed alive and well. The recent National Intelligence Council’s report Global Trends 2030 – Alternative Worlds has identified that the top trend over the next 15-25 years will be individual empowerment. Fuelled in part, by the combination of the progressive reduction in global poverty, increasing

technology

People who chronically multitask show an enormous range of deficits. They’re basically terrible at all sorts of cognitive tasks, including multitasking.

levels of education and the continued uptake of innovative, ubiquitous information and communications technology is expected to reshape how organisations, societies and countries operate. Consider the digital democracy from a number of perspectives: •D emocratisation of technology This is the foundation for the digital democracy. For the first time, individuals and organisations alike are able to select from a burgeoning array of innovative, powerful, easyto-use and low-cost information and communications technology solutions. The cloud computing paradigm, combined with powerful mobile smartphones and tablets has let the IT genie out of the bottle, never to be returned. Access to IT systems were previously the domain of larger organisations, mostly due to the fact that expensive hardware and IT support services were needed, combined with the fact that most earlier generation IT systems were not that user-friendly. • Democratisation of knowledge This is not exactly a new concept. From cave paintings, books and now to the digital domain, the ability to access a seemingly infinite array of knowledge is akin to drinking from a fire hydrant. The democracy of knowledge can also be a double-edged sword, however. The dissemination of knowledge that has been subject to appropriate review, validation and rigour would be seen as more “trustworthy”. The peer review process and associated academic rigour is what sets the academic process apart from opinion. However, when knowledge is disseminated without the appropriate evidence based rigour, this can have potentially disastrous consequences. The current debate over low childhood immunisation rates is one such example. •D emocratisation of skill University sector is not alone when it comes to the transformative power associated with the democratisation of skill. The legal industry, one of the classic professions, is being transformed by the democratisation www.campusreview.com.au

and globalisation of skills. As more and more companies bypass law firms and go straight to legal process outsource (LPO) providers, law firms are now realising the influence LPO providers have in the market. •S hadow IT Also known as ‘voting with your feet’, the phenomenon of shadow IT can help transform an organisation as it can act as a crucible for innovation and act as a prototype for new systems and business processes, however having shadow IT play a key part of your enterprise IT strategy presents serious risks. In its 2012 CIO new year’s resolutions, Gartner stated: “Shadow IT can create risks of data loss, corruption or misuse, and risks of inefficient and disconnected processes and information”: a warning that should set off alarm bells in the offices of all VCs and faculty deans. What Gartner is talking about is not just an IT problem but an organisation-wide, systemic problem that requires an organisational response. This is not an IT problem to be solved.

Pedagogy and emerging technologies

We are all immersed in our own multifunctional, concurrent digital worlds. Multitasking seems to be de rigueur for the contemporary student. Plugged into Facebook, listening to music and studying at all the same time seems to be the default position. So, what role does the technologically rich, concurrent learning experience have to do with the overall pedagogy? According to professor Clifford Nass of Stanford University, “The top 25 per cent of Stanford students are using four or more media at one time whenever they’re using media. However, he goes on to say, “The research is almost unanimous, which is very rare in social science, and it says that people who chronically multitask show an enormous range of deficits. They’re basically terrible at all sorts of cognitive tasks, including multitasking.” In the world of new, emerging and disruptive technologies, when applied to the student learning environment,

educational professionals should be cognisant of the potential drawbacks of how these technologies are used.

From Learning to e-Learning to m-Learning, to p-Learning…

The journey of the transformation of learning is seemingly endless. From oldschool, teacher-led learning, to e-Learning, to m-Learning (Mobile Learning) to p-Learning (Pervasive Learning), the tags and brands given to learning modalities are often the realm of consulting organisations, IT vendors and marketers attempting to define a framework that helps to create the need that can define a market. This is analogous to pharmaceutical companies who are accused of influencing the definition of diseases. The routine human condition – unhappiness, stomach aches and boredom – are increasingly being redefined as disease, which helps define the market. Know what you are dealing with by defining your business model first, may be a good start.

Appetite for change

Question is, what is the appetite for a change from the organisation’s perspective? The opportunities for universities to maximise the upside potential of disruptive, new and emerging technologies exists. The challenge however, is ensuring that these volatile, new and emerging technologies fit within a coherent, commercially viable enterprise business strategy, which enterprise IT and the ecosystem of IT providers supports and delivers against. The intentional fragmentation of IT systems, technologies and related services across faculties has the potential to contribute to the duplication of effort, especially in the back-office and administrative functions within faculties.

The next step

Defining the business roadmap for the adoption of new disruptive technologies for organisations as complex as a large, established university is no trivial matter. The first, and probably most important step on the road to success, lies in having key executive stakeholders having a common, well-informed understanding as to what potential the new technology landscape can deliver. How to achieve that common understanding in the short term, when immersed in a sea of opinion, however, is quite another matter. n Rob Livingstone is a former CIO and owner of a Sydney-based IT advisory practice. He is also a fellow at the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS). June 2013 | 29

TAFE

Collaborate

to compete

The TAFE SA solution It’s time for Australia to increase its skills base – a point on which both sides of politics agree. But how should it be done? By Ruth Schubert

AFE as a system and public provider is under review and scrutiny in a way not seen for a generation. The national agenda is seeking to maximise the skills and qualifications of the national workforce, at the same time as achieving efficiencies in the costs associated with the delivery. The national imperative is for higher skills as a means of driving innovation in smart and globally competitive industries and enterprises. However, while the end result has bipartisan political support, the means to the end does not. The policy drivers to achieve the changes are many and varied across the state jurisdictions; one key mechanism is the student entitlement model as a means of increasing competition in the sector. The implementation and management of the student entitlement for Victorian TAFEs has been at best turbulent, and indeed the full impact on the Victorian TAFE system is yet to be seen. The recent injection of adjustment funds now has amalgamations and mergers being seriously considered. In South Australia, the decision to implement Skills for All, which is the student entitlement demand-driven model, required that the TAFE system was at arm’s length from the funder and government agency. The move to establish a statutory corporation as a government business has enabled the chair of the board to report directly to the minister of the day. The appointment of a highly-qualified and wellconnected board has enabled a degree of independence not previously possible. 30 | June 2013

So while the governance of TAFE SA moved from within a government department (Department of Further Education, Employment, Science and Technology) to a fully functioning board and chair, the other remaining question was how will TAFE SA actually operate within the state? Given the decision to have an open and fully contestable market, driven by student demand, the question was then asked and had indeed been asked for some time, would TAFE SA be in a better position to compete if it was one organisation, as one Registered Training Organisation (RTO), instead of as a federated three-institute model? During the past six months this question has been seriously questioned by both the board and senior management. The concept of ‘Stronger as One’ was endorsed by the board and then put to all the staff of TAFE SA for their view; this has been overwhelmingly supported by all levels of the organisation with a 96 per cent “yes” vote in the March survey. Since that time, a full-scale restructure has been in train. The new chief executive officer of TAFE SA, Jeff Gunningham, commenced on June 3. The most senior executive positions have been filled and the directors of business units appointed. The model is about four pillars, education being managed and delivered under the direction of the executive director, with the three other equally senior pillars providing dedicated leadership and account management

services in the areas of business development and regions, operations, and finances. The fundamental principle in the way TAFE SA is being positioned and transformed is that as one system, one RTO, and one structure, the organisation is best positioned to capitalise on the expertise and innovation within all areas of the business to ensure effective and efficient service across the state in an open market. The ‘Stronger as One’ model allows for a complete integration of delivery across the state. In the background over the last three years, infrastructure planning has moved to support dedicated and specialist centres such as the Regency International Centre, Adelaide College of the Arts, Veterinary and Applied Sciences Centre, Urrbrae Education Centre, Sustainable Industries Education Centre under construction at Tonsley Park and the soon-

TAFE

to-be-built Mining and Engineering Centre. These specialist centres are part of a spoke and hub model. In regional locations, infrastructure investment has supported further development of community level facilities. This has seen investment in the campuses at Whyalla, Mount Gambier and Murray Bridge, with further development planned for Port Augusta. A strategic agreement with the three major universities in South Australia has also enabled development of closer relationships with the university sector as a means of increasing articulation arrangements to and from the university sector, contracted and joint delivery of university courses, while still maintaining Higher Education (HE) registration as TAFE SA. As one system with one RTO, these partnership arrangements enable delivery of niche HE products and services to regional and remote parts of the state, with increased university presence at regional sites. www.campusreview.com.au

Service delivery in South Australia poses some unique challenges, largely due to the concentration of population in the capital city (over 70 per cent), with many small centres across a vast area. TAFE SA has developed considerable expertise in online and blended delivery methodologies. This has been in response to these markets where the critical mass was not in one location, but also ensuring consistent service. This expertise and innovation is a key strength for the new one TAFE SA. The appointment of the seven directors of the business units, under the leadership of the executive director, means that for the first time both the management and strategic leadership for education delivery will be consistent across the state. In any amalgamation, a concern for those in regional locations is that amalgamation will be in effect centralisation; this is not the case for this change with the commitment

to appoint regional managers in each of the regional development Australia regions. These positions will provide a senior officer presence for TAFE SA in the regions, with a focus on external engagement, business development and support for locally based staff. The transformation of TAFE SA is still a work in progress; however what sets this process apart is the united commitment to one system, one RTO and one structure, and the realisation that collaboration is an effective and efficient business model. It also positions TAFE SA on both the state and national stage as a major player in the vocational and education market, a potential yet to be fully realised; one that is a rare opportunity and firmly on the radar of the TAFE SA leadership team. n Dr Ruth Schubert is director of business transformation at TAFE SA. June 2013 | 31

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VC’s corner

On target for the

demand-driven system

What do famous leaks and the demanddriven education system have in common? By Greg Craven

32 | June 2013

range of leaks have changed the course of history. In the United States, the Pentagon Papers brought about the beginning of the end of the Vietnam War. In the United Kingdom, the leaked Zinoviev Letter helped bring down Britain’s first Labour government. And in Australia, David Kemp’s leaked 1999 Cabinet submission changed the course of higher education. Unfortunately for Kemp, the political fall-out from the leak meant that, at the time, the reforms had about as much chance of being enacted as Lance Armstrong has of being named ethical sportsman of the year. David Kemp saw a system where demand for university places was outstripping supply, where centralised control of places stopped competition between institutions. Kemp envisaged a sector open to all students, subject to the university’s capacity to teach students and the student meeting the entry requirements. Such a system would increase overall participation in universities particularly for those who were first in family and from a low socioeconomic background. In March 2008, Julia Gillard, took the next step and commissioned a review of higher education under professor Denise Bradley. The Bradley Review, like Kemp, recommended a demand-driven university system. The Bradley Review concluded that a demanddriven system was necessary “if Australia is to achieve better attainment of higher education qualifications. This would give students stronger incentives to participate and provide institutions with the flexibility to decide the courses they will offer and the number of students they will admit. In such a system, choice, underpinned by good information and stronger quality assurance, will

drive both a higher quality student experience and institutional diversity”. And Bradley was right. Gillard acted on the review’s recommendations and drove the reforms. Opening access to universities is one of the lasting achievements of the Rudd/ Gillard years. There are now 189,000 more students attending university as a result of the demand-driven system. The government set a target that by 2025, 40 per cent of people aged 25-34 years old would have a bachelor degree or higher. The government is well on track to achieving this reform. And all the available evidence shows this is the right policy for Australia. Even the Coalition supports it. The fact is that students who have a university education will have better, richer (in every sense), and more productive lives. Even the Grattan Institute – that paragon of evidence-based policy and fiscal restraint – argues that “graduates do well out of higher education. They have attractive jobs, above-average pay and status. They take interesting courses and enjoy student life.” The demand-driven system provides more opportunities for more Australians to have access to such a life. The effect of the demand-driven system is particularly noticeable for those students who are first in their family to attend university – the daughters of Maltese metal workers and the sons of Vietnamese boatpeople become the teachers and accountants of tomorrow. Not only has the demand-driven system had a positive effect on the number of students who have access to education, but they are having a positive effect on the way universities deliver education. The days of the “Sage on the Stage”, the “Chalk and Talk” and the academic deity are over – even law professors are not immune. When students have more choice, institutions have

VC’s corner

to think more carefully about their product: the experience and individual attention that students receive. It is no longer enough for the academic to talk at the student; they have to engage the student in a more interactive learning environment. The demanddriven system has forced universities to consider reforms in the delivery of teaching that we’ve only talked about before. Universities also have to think more about their role in preparing students for the workforce. In particular, they need to consider pathways in to universities, and from universities to employers. Universities have to become savvier at differentiating their product and their delivery. The demand-driven system forces universities to view students as the customer and their needs as paramount. While this has been the rhetoric for some time, the demand-driven system has made it the reality. If students don’t like the product, they can go to the competitor down the road for a product that is more tailored to their needs. The system is also having an effect on university administrations. Normally such bodies move with the speed of a Galapagos Island tortoise trapped in a cardigan. But the demand-driven system is exposing both strengths and weaknesses in institutions and forcing university administrators to reconsider old business models. Although the sector has always talked about specialisation and diversity, the demand-driven system makes universities focus on and invest in strengths rather than cover weaknesses. Thirty-nine universities can no longer afford to do thirty-nine versions of the same thing. The demand-driven system is forcing an analysis of university strengths based on the principles of allocative efficiency. In a time of fiscal restraint and deficit reduction – Commonwealth government bean counters, take note. But there are some who don’t like the system. They create a false choice for governments between spending money on students and spending money on research. They believe that you can’t have both opportunity and excellence. They yearn for the protected coziness of the past where they did not have to work hard for student places. These university players are like www.campusreview.com.au

manufacturers who prospered behind tariff walls but whose businesses could not compete in a deregulated market – except because they are university professors, they elicit no public sympathy. They yearn for an end to the demanddriven system and a restoration of the ancient regime. But to return to that model is apostasy. It would unwind the benefits that are occurring both in terms of student service and economic efficiency. And despite the protestations for those who wish to enact a “White Terror” on the sector, it would not give a small minority of institutions access to more research funds, nor would it see more of our universities rocket up the charts in the global hit parade. Universities have been teaching Australians since the first pimply-faced youth took his place at the University of Sydney in 1850. Australian Catholic University has, in various forms, been teaching since Mary MacKillop started work as a governess 10 years after that, and we have continued to adapt and change as the demands on us have adapted and changed. Since the Second World War governments of both persuasions have sought to get universities to provide greater opportunities for more Australians and to develop greater differentiation between institutions. But it is only the Kemp-Gillard demand driven system – a market-based system – that has driven both opportunity and diversity. And that’s something about which both the Labor and Liberal parties can be proud. n Professor Greg Craven is vice-chancellor of Australian Catholic University. June 2013 | 33

VET

VET challenged by core, not high-level, skills

Australia’s future is dependent on more adults acquiring basic learning skills, but can VET teachers meet this need? By John Mitchell

hile some VET policy makers are focused on the glamorous end of the educational spectrum – that is, keeping count of the number of people who acquire higher level qualifications – they are possibly overlooking a more important issue: how can we help the vast number of adult Australians who are struggling to read, write and use numbers? One policy body that is well aware of this language, literacy and numeracy (LLN) challenge, and vigorously promoting its importance, is the Australian Workforce and Productivity Agency (AWPA). Its March 2013 publication Future Focus includes a confronting chapter on the issue, with this pointed statement at the start of the section: “Our modeling shows increased industry demand for higher level skills, but around 50 per cent of Australians have been assessed as having literacy and/ or numeracy scores below the minimum standard needed to manage the complex demands of life and work.” AWPA’s chapter then delivers a series of hard-hitting statements on the matter, including this one: “People with literacy 34 | June 2013

and numeracy needs find it difficult, if not impossible, to obtain higher level qualifications and are far more likely to not be employed, that is to be unemployed or not in the labour force.” AWPA says the LLN issue is profound, affecting the future prosperity of the nation. “This is not a marginal issue. It is a huge challenge for mainstream Australia and it is constraining individual opportunity and economic development. Building LLN skills will be critical to increasing labour force participation and transitioning to a more productive, higher skilled economy.” AWPA quotes some confronting figures about the scale of the issue. For instance, the 2006 Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey found that approximately seven million adult Australians had literacy scores below level 111, the minimum level required to function fully in society and work. AWPA challenges those who simply focus on keeping a tally of how many students acquire qualifications, without first addressing the LLN issues: “Australia will require a significant growth in qualifications, particularly higher level qualifications. Without a marked improvement in LLN in Australia, this will be unachievable.”

Diagnosing students’ skill levels

In another major report released by the Commonwealth in 2012, Australian Core Skills Framework (ACSF), the three LLN skills were integrated into a set of five skills: reading, writing, numeracy, learning and oral communication. The report noted that the inclusion of learning as a core skill signifies “the critical importance of adopting strategies that help us adapt to changing circumstances and new challenges throughout our lives.” A lead author of the ACSF report, David Tout, senior research fellow, Numeracy and Mathematics, at the Australian Council for Education Research (ACER), believes that core skills underpin the lifelong success of the individual, not just in education but in work and life, so there is a strong case for investment by the nation in supporting the acquisition of core skills. “There’s now enough evidence to show that if you invest in core skills you’re going to gain a lot of benefits: better employability, a better chance to actually go further in your lifelong learning, a better chance of not being reliant on social security networks. Invest in core skills and there are benefits to the individual, to society, to industry, to everything.” The ACSF report, of which Tout was co-author, emphasised that core skills were needed not just at the lower qualification levels, but at all levels. “The research

VET shows that if you invest a dollar [developing students’ core skills] at lower qualification levels you get a better return on your investment, but there are challenges going up the line as well,” says Tout. “We are increasing the demands in workplaces and in training: each year we say, well, Certificate III is no longer a good enough minimum, we want Certificate IV. Every time we increase that hurdle, then the demands on having higher core skills increases as well. “Initially, we had to give the message that it was the lower levels that were really crucial, but I think that more and more we’re asking for higher levels of training and education then we’re going to need higher levels of core skills. It’s an ever-increasing demand that’s also just part of the 21st century.” Tout is not only focused on teachers helping students develop core skills, but also is focused on teachers being able to diagnose what level of core skills are possessed by students at different qualification levels, because if students don’t have all five core skills, such as numeracy, they may drop out of the course. “We’ve now realised that the core skills, especially of literacy and numeracy, are barriers that we haven’t [fully] recognised in students. A considerable number of drop-outs and non-completions will occur because the students can’t read and write and do the mathematics.” Teachers need to be more aware of this student skill gap, says Tout: “There’s a lack of awareness by teachers and that’s why you need some sort of diagnosis in order to at least be able to say, ‘Oh, we’ve got 50-something per cent of learners coming in to this course who are going to have significant numeracy problems so what are we going to do about it?’ And then once you’ve done that, you have to know what to do about it.”

Measuring teachers’ skill levels

Tout believes that some VET practitioners may have limitations with their own core skills, particularly at higher levels. “In the VET sector, there are a number of complications. One is that the workforce could have issues with their own literacy and core skills levels so there’s a workforce capacity issue.” The next problem is that some VET practitioners, who only require a Certificate IV in training and assessment, are not skilled enough to diagnose students’ level of core skills: “There is this whole issue of what the Certificate IV covers in terms of the actual delivery of VET training. Certificate IV is a minimal level qualification and if you’re also then expected to be able to address literacy and numeracy issues, it’s not simple, it’s complex. www.campusreview.com.au

“If VET practitioners don’t have an awareness and some [relevant] skills and knowledge, then basically they’re not going to address and be able to bridge that gap between what the learners have got and what they’re expected to achieve in the course. It’s a really significant problem.” “What I observe in VET training is that [some] trainers resort to the old drill and practise type approach, which is going back to how they were taught at school. That’s not going to work because that approach failed the people sitting in their training rooms.” Currently VET practitioners are required to undertake one unit on language, literacy and numeracy in the Certificate IV, but this is insufficient, Tout says. “Making one unit in LLN in the Certificate IV compulsory is not going to get you very far; it’s a band-aid and only a small one.” He holds on to the hope that practitioners will realise they need more qualifications: “My hope is that if we keep raising the issue eventually people will say ‘Well, I need to have higher skill set or I need to do a diploma’.” For Tout, the issue of VET practitioners’ capabilities is the crucial one: “A lot of the trainers don’t know any other way of doing it; they just think, ‘Well, the way I got here is by learning it off by rote and that’s what I’ll now do, that’s how I’ll teach my trainers’. I think that this issue is the core of it all.” “I think if we don’t address the workforce capability then we’re not going to get very far. There are two issues: one is we need more LLN expertise and we know that’s an area that we haven’t got the expertise that we probably had 10 or 15 years ago. And then secondly, there is the issue of up skilling the rest of the VET workforce to at least give them some ability to address the issue of core skills.” Based on my own research, VET practitioners agree with Tout that they lack skills in this area. Over the last twelve months, my company has surveyed 2,088 VET practitioners from large training providers around Australia using the

VETCAT survey instrument for VET trainers and assessors. In that period, additional questions were included in the survey to gauge VET practitioners’ views about their capabilities in using skills that had been added to their practice in the last few years, like using the Australian Core Skills Framework (ACSF) In response to the VETCAT survey over the last year, VET practitioners rated their level of skills at around 68 per cent for using the Australian Core Skills Framework (ACSF) to determine learners’ skill levels and at around 67 per cent for supporting the development of adult language, literacy and numeracy skills. They believe they possess around two-thirds of the skills needed in these areas. These ratings can be compared with their much higher rating at around 82 per cent of their skill in participating in assessment validation processes. If calls for improvement to developing student core skills from national bodies such as AWPA and from research experts such as ACER’s Tout are to be achieved, the skills of VET practitioners need to be addressed urgently. And VET practitioners concur. n Dr John Mitchell provides tools for measuring workforce capabilities. See www.jmaanalytics.com.au Disclaimer: ACER provides analysis of quantitative data from Mitchell’s capability analysis tools.

June 2013 | 35

VET

The

marketisation of

TAFE

Governments should think very carefully before they wreck an institution, because once itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s gone, it is very hard to put it back together again. 36 | June 2013

State and federal governments continue to cut the heart out of TAFE institutions. But learning is about more than mere supply and demand. By Leesa Wheelahan

VET

AFE is not a ‘provider’ of vocational education and training; it is an educational institution which, like schools and universities, is essential to Australia’s social cohesion, productivity and international economic competitiveness. But TAFE is being wrecked. Victoria is leading the charge. TAFE’s share of publicly funded students in Victoria declined from 67 per cent in 2008 to 42 per cent in 2012, while private providers’ share increased from 16 per cent to 46 per cent over that time. Private providers are now the majority providers in 11 of 19 industries in Victoria, and they dominate in industries where programs can be run cheaply and in high volume. For example, they now have 92 per cent of publicly funded enrolments in financial and insurance services, 74 per cent in administration and support services, 78 per cent in public administration and safety, 75 per cent in retail trade, 72 per cent in transport, postal and warehousing, and 83 per cent in wholesale trade. In contrast, private providers have only 4 per cent of enrolments in mining, 6 per cent in professional, scientific and technical services (which includes a lot of engineering) and 11 per cent in information media and telecommunication. Why? Because it costs a lot of money to run programs in these areas and monstrous profits can’t be made. TAFE’s share of publicly funded students is declining nationally, and this will accelerate as the other states catch up to Victoria and implement similar policies. For example, in 2008, TAFE taught 74 per cent of all publicly funded students nationally; this declined to 60 per cent in 2011. The Victorian government seeks to put TAFEs and private providers on an “equal footing” in the market that it has created, but TAFE is clearly being hammered. The Victorian government has stripped millions of dollars from TAFE institutes and then told them that they have to become just like private providers, just another provider that doesn’t do anything particularly special. The Victorian government made this clear in its submission to the current House of Representatives Inquiry into the role of TAFE saying, “TAFE institutes should no longer assume that they are required to deliver community service obligations that are not explicitly required and funded by government”. Instead of supporting TAFE, the Victorian government is reducing it to a residual institution that provides programs private providers do not, will not or cannot do. This is what markets do to TAFE, when it is required to compete with private providers that can choose what to teach and who to teach, while not providing students with the kind of support that TAFE provides. The Victorian government is prepared to wreck one institution – TAFE – so another institution – the market – can dominate. There is no evidence anywhere in the world that fully contestable markets in education have delivered the outcomes governments seek. The evidence is, in contrast, that the pursuit of markets is driven by an ideological belief in their fitness for purpose for all areas of social life. In a frank article in Campus Review in 2008, Robin Ryan, who was involved in the development of marketisation policies in VET, argues that these policies were developed on the basis of little evidence. He says ‘the fundamental point of the desirability of market forces in VET has almost always been resolved simply by assertion, often with reference back to a report which had previously made the same act of faith’. The question that market proselytisers are not able to address is: how are the social and public good purposes of

www.campusreview.com.au

VET to be articulated, implemented and advanced? They seem to believe that these purposes will be met through Australia’s 5300 VET providers all responding to market signals. It is based on a belief that because VET provision is a ‘product’ like any other product (for example, widgets), then all that is needed is for ‘customers’ to articulate their demands and entrepreneurial providers will respond. However, rather than consolidation, this is leading to fragmentation. The key difference between education and a market in widgets is that educational institutions have a key role to play in responding to society’s needs, in articulating what those needs are and developing appropriate responses which are further developed and changed as society changes. Universities do this through research, the creation of knowledge, serving as society’s conscience and critic and education for the professions. Schools do this by ensuring that young people have the foundational knowledge they need for their lives as citizens and as workers. This changes as society changes. TAFE does this through its support for disadvantaged students and in developing the knowledge and skills that are needed for an innovative, competitive workforce. It anticipates, develops, codifies and institutionalises knowledge and skills needed the workforce now, but also in the future. It is not just a matter of responding to existing demand and to work as it is currently. TAFE’s role in workforce development is not limited to relationships with employers; it supports industries and the workforce more broadly and anticipates the future. Reducing all relationships to market signals is to reduce them to transactions and there is no role for these developmental purposes. For example, all TAFE directors and senior staff are on local regional economic development committees and they play a role in supporting and developing the economic and social infrastructure in their communities and in workplaces. TAFE teachers are engaged in their industries, in workplaces and with their communities. This is the ‘invisible’ work that TAFE undertakes, yet this is at stake in current marketisation policies and funding cutbacks. A transactional basis for the provision of VET narrows the role that institutions are able to play in supporting students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Markets in VET will result in institutions (including TAFEs) pursuing activities that result in a profit, and this will become the most important criterion in deciding what provision should be offered. Governments may be prepared to fund specific activities when there is market failure or thin markets and they perceive that this is having negative consequences for equity and for regions. However, this moves working with disadvantaged communities from being an intrinsic part of what TAFEs do, to being ‘extra’, requiring additional funding, and TAFEs won’t be able to do this work without additional funding. It isn’t just a matter of government providing specific funding to run a program at a loss for a disadvantaged group to try to address these problems; rather, current policies removes working with disadvantaged students as a key defining purpose of TAFE and all that it does. Governments should think very carefully before they wreck an institution, because once it’s gone, it is very hard to put it back together again. The Howard, Rudd and Gillard governments have tried very hard to reintroduce technical high schools without real success. If a whole sector is fragmented, we lose institutional capacity for the future. n Leesa Wheelahan is an associate professor at the LH Martin Institute and Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne. June 2013 | 37

VET

Accelerating qualification

It’s time universities made it easier – and faster – for students to earn and learn, by freeing up facilities. By Stuart Middleton

s it really necessary for students to take so long to get a qualification? Why are the campus facilities used for such a small proportion of the day and of the year? How can we get more people into post-secondary education? Where is the capital for us to have more buildings/ laboratories/ teaching facilities? Should students be able to more easily earn and learn? There is a cluster of questions that seems to boil down to the one cause and possibly, the one solution. That issue is the length of the academic semester and the low levels of facility use. Huge campuses are provided for an activity that takes up half the year and a third of the day when they are in business. I am talking here mostly about the teaching / learning side of the HE institutions. Researchers would tell you with some justice that their year is long and the work day starts early and goes into the night. Let’s just accept that and deal with the students and taught courses. There are limits to just how much teaching staff could and should work, so we have arrangements about workloads. The discussion about getting better use of facilities and more students into institutions is not about that – there would have to be a commensurate increase in teaching staff to manage. And manage this we must. It is an absurdity that public money is spent on facilities that have so little use. It would be a reasonable assumption that classes could be scheduled from say 8.30am until 9pm. This addresses earn and learn issues. Many former students in higher education have had full-time work, and many continue to do so. But if the traditional “part-time” model applies, it is a long road. How can we accelerate courses for such students? First, by looking at the time needed to complete a program. Given the actual teaching time required in qualifications, many of them could be completed in 38 | June 2013

a much shorter time. Many three-year degrees could be completed in two years with a trimester approach or by using a blended delivery. Stanford University has recently launched its MOOC platform, NovoEd, after some intensive activity in their development centre, Venture Lab, which was set up to research ways of developing the MOOC approach. Interestingly, they have announced a program of course offerings that consists of an even split between those offered to students outside the university and those who are enrolled in courses at Stanford. With the growing belief that MOOCs could be adequately delivered, assessed and therefore credited to real qualifications, this could open opportunities for both increased numbers in programs and for faster completion by students. The flipped classroom development – the stuff traditionally done in class is completed by the students and the extension work that leads to understanding and application, often done in isolation by the student in their own time, is the material of discursive and interactive teaching in class sessions. When countries review their approaches to assessment and qualifications, the promise is usually that time served would be dead. But those at the delivery end generally ensure that this doesn’t happen. In New Zealand, the shift to achievement-based assessment carried with it this promise. But courses remain stacked like Lego bricks into their component parts and in the right order, you have to have a yellow layer before the red layer and the blue bricks are for the top – just like it’s always been. I know of only one program that is enabling students to learn and then be assessed at levels that reflect their capability – levels that are usually caged up in different year levels. In such an instance, the curriculum provides the learning

and the assessment reflects the level of the learning. It is more typical that the assessments drive the learning. Education has an immune system that repels change and while facilities are modernised, the uses made of them are not. As methods of communicating and teaching develop rapidly and are adopted widely in the community, education takes place in a nostalgic reflection of a past age. The key elements of higher education look much as they did half a century, or even a century ago. And there is great nervousness when suggestions are made that a permissive approach to a qualification framework might lead to shorter courses, higher qualifications with a research component and so on. Surely there are reasons why such changes are logical and in the interests of the communities that education institutions serve. The development of two-year associate degrees caused quite a stir in the US and a smaller ripple in Australia when it was undertaken. New Zealand has yet to even consider such a change. So all those questions posed at the start of this piece might share a common answer. What is required is an acceptance that the way in which higher education works is not God-given, nor has it happened by grand design. Our current ways of working are simply a reflection of the accidental accumulation of things which we hang on to that suited someone in the past. I have just gone through graduation week – probably the happiest week of the year. Students who graduated completed their courses last year. They “graduate” six months later for no reason other than at some time in the past it was necessary for the universities in New Zealand to send examination scripts back to Mother England in sailing ships to be marked and checked. That seems like a good sound reason for working as we do. n

noticeboard Leaders of teaching hospitals

Powerful in health service

A leading medical researcher has been appointed dean of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences at the University of Melbourne. Professor Stephen Smith is currently vice-president (research) at Nanyang Technological University and is the founding dean of the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, a joint initiative of Nanyang and Imperial College London. Smith was a pioneer of the first Academic Health Science Centre in the UK while principal of the Faculty of Medicine at Imperial College London, and served simultaneously for four years as chief executive of the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. Developing integrated health and research strategies was his work at leading British medical institutions, including Cambridge University, where he was professor and head of the department of obstetrics and gynaecology. He will start in September.

Million dollar fundraiser

The University of Adelaide’s first chief engagement officer is Kate Robertson, a highly respected leader in development and alumni relations in higher education in Britain. Currently director of campaign and alumni relations office at the University of Nottingham, Robertson has extensive development experience including appointments at the University of Liverpool, the Royal Academy of Arts and the English National Opera. She led the Nottingham campaign, which has so far raised over UK£90 million ($133 million) and a gift of UK£12 million ($18 million), the largest corporate gift for higher education in the UK outside Oxford and Cambridge. She will commence in September.

World-class thought leader

STRICTLYSPEAKING

Scientia Professor Ross Buckley is appointed the new chair in international finance and regulation at the University of New South Wales. He will drive research into systemic responses to global financial insecurity. Leading international law firm, King & Wood

Mallesons, sponsored the establishment of the Chair in partnership with the Centre for International Finance and Regulation (CIFR), hosted by UNSW Law. Buckley is a world-class thought leader on financial governance. He won the only Australian Research Council Discovery Outstanding Researcher Award in law this year for a project looking at systemic responses to global financial instability.

Head of global engagement

Professor Gary Smith is Deakin University’s new deputy vicechancellor (global engagement). Smith was previously responsible for the development and management of global partnerships as pro vice-chancellor (engagement and international) at the University of Western Sydney. Prior to joining UWS, Smith was already with Deakin in a number of roles including professor of international relations and program director at the Centre for Defence and Strategic Studies at the Australian Defence College. Smith is an active researcher in Australian and international relations and is the author and editor of numerous publications on international relations in the Asia-Pacific, global governance and civil society. Smith commenced in May.

Three pivotal clinical leadership roles will lead clinical education, research and academic activities at the faculty of health sciences at the University of Queensland. Professor Gerald Holtmann began as associate dean (clinical) in March. He will oversee multidisciplinary clinical engagement across schools and clinical schools in the Faculty of Health Sciences. He has had a distinguished career as a physician scientist in Australia and Germany. Holtmann is currently director of gastroenterology and hepatology at Princess Alexandra Hospital. Professor Darrell Crawford, the new head of UQ’s Southwestern Clinical School Cluster, will lead and direct all clinical schools within the cluster including Princess Alexandra, Mater, Greenslopes, QEII and Ipswich hospitals. Crawford is a leading hepatologist and clinical scientist, who until recently, was head of the clinical school at Greenslopes Private Hospital and head of the discipline of medicine at UQ. Professor Leonie Callaway, head of UQ’s Northern Clinical School Cluster, will lead and direct all clinical schools within the cluster environment, including Royal Brisbane and Women’s, Prince Charles, Nambour, Redcliffe, Caboolture, Wesley and St Andrew’s hospitals. Callaway is an obstetric physician whose research and clinical focus is on obesity and medical disorders during pregnancy. She has been head of the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital Clinical School since 2007.

DINKUM

Colloquial words that come from nowhere can be redeployed and radically redesigned in different times and places. Dinkum is one such, which probably originated in C19 Northern English dialects, though in Australia it’s sometimes thought to consist of two Chinese syllables. Citations in the Oxford English Dictionary Online show it was used among Sheffield coal-miners as a noun meaning “hard work”, and in North Lincolnshire as an adjective in the sense of “honest, genuine”. Both senses were known in Australia by 1900, and they merge in the self-referential use of Dinkums by Australian soldiers (the “Diggers” of Second Division of the AIF in World War I), and for New Zealanders as well. Like many Australian colloquialisms, dinkum in its adjectival sense was subsequently abbreviated to dinky. But this same string of letters (dinky) was harnessed in American English in the 1980s as the acronym for the consumer label “dual income, no kids”. It was widely applied to career-oriented, upwardly mobile adults for whom a work/ lifestyle balance was not a high priority. Even more curiously, the acronym now appears in American sources as dinkum, standing for “dual income, no kids, unbelievable mortgage”. For Australians this puts hard grind back into the word – as the work they owe to the bank to pay the mortgage on the place they may not have much time to enjoy living in. Plus ça change... Written by emeritus professor Pam Peters, researcher at Macquarie University’s Centre for Language Sciences.

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June 2013 | 39