Australian Universities Accord report recommends sweeping changes to tertiary education

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The cost of university degrees how they're paid back and who's admitted could be set for an overhaul. The final Australian University Accord report has been released and includes a plan to ensure that, by 2050 at least 80% of our workforce will have higher education qualifications.

Transcript

00:00 We're cautiously optimistic. I think the Accord final report has much to commend it, but we're

00:08 still going through the kind of fine print and detail and looking for those unintended

00:12 consequences and things that don't work so well for staff and students.

00:18 Now casualisation of the workforce in universities, it's been a well documented issue. What in

00:23 this report could address that?

00:25 Look, the report alludes to and makes mention of the devastating impact that casualisation

00:30 has. Two thirds of our public universities, people who work in our public universities

00:35 are employed insecurely. This has devastating consequences for the individual, but also

00:40 consequences for universities and students.

00:43 So the report talks about insecure work, but we're really hoping through things like the

00:47 Tertiary Education Commission, how the Futures Fund might be operated that deals squarely

00:53 with the problems that insecure work creates.

00:57 Tell us more about the Tertiary Education Commission. What would that bring?

01:01 Look, the Tertiary Education Commission is one of the recommendations we fully support.

01:06 Governance has been a big problem for many years across Australian universities, and

01:10 we're hoping through things like the Tertiary Education, we can get governance right in

01:15 our universities. So we put an end to things like wage theft. We make sure there are staff

01:19 and students' voices that are heard, and we ensure that our universities are governed

01:23 in the interests of staff and students and the good of the nation.

01:27 Now looking at those Morrison-era changes around fees for courses, so charging more

01:32 for humanities, arts degrees, charging less for nursing, it didn't actually change the

01:36 take-up significantly. Do you want to see that scrapped?

01:39 Yes, we're very happy that the jobs graduate legislation will be scrapped. It had terrible

01:46 implications for the sector, and it didn't work as it was intended. So we're really grateful

01:52 and pleased that that will go. We're hoping it will go. We really want to ensure that

01:56 our universities are funded adequately. Australia funds its universities far less than many

02:01 of our countries internationally. We really need to ensure that our universities are funded

02:06 so that they can achieve their core purposes, world-quality research and teaching.

02:11 And as to teaching models, are there some that can better address disadvantage?

02:17 Look, teaching should always look at, I suppose, the students and what works best for the students.

02:23 But if you are to do that, if there are students that are to be supported in terms of their

02:27 wellbeing, pastoral care or their academic work, we need to ensure that's properly funded.

02:34 Teaching and research across our universities is under enormous pressure, and if we are

02:39 to meet the needs of students, we need to invest in teaching, we need to invest in research

02:44 to ensure that students receive the support they deserve.

02:48 Speaking of research, what are the suggested changes around that?

02:51 Look, some of the changes around research are pretty exciting. For example, there's

02:55 a recommendation that research will be fully funded. Now, this is really important. When,

03:00 for example, people are...

03:01 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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