Newsletter

The “Higher Education Newsletter” is prepared and distributed each month by the Office of Higher Education Policy and Projects (OHEPP).  It is sent directly to all senior staff at UWS for use or referral to other UWS staff. Other staff may subscribe directly by filling in their details on the right hand side of this page.

The newsletter seeks to provide an overview of key developments in higher education and in Greater Western Sydney, most relevant to UWS. It contains links to relevant sources and includes brief commentary to outline the relevance of the issue for UWS. 

OHEPP utilises many sources to populate the newsletter (including Campus Review, Higher Education Supplement, government newsletters/releases, conferences, Universities Australia, general media and other online content).

We hope that you find the newsletter useful. Your feedback is most welcome. 

If you would like to contribute to future issues, please send content or suggestions to h.splarn@uws.edu.au or angelique.fitzgerald@uws.edu.au.


A snapshot of key higher education and regional issues with possible implications for the University of Western Sydney

Good news - Government defers decision to impose $2000 cap on education expenses

Universities Australia | 2 August 2013 | Universities Australia (opens in a new window)

In breaking news, the Commonwealth government announced on 2 August 2013 that it will defer its decision to impose a $2,000 cap on self-education expenses, and instead undertake a review. While it is good news, it would have been better if the reduced cap proposal had been completely withdrawn, as it poses a risk to postgraduate enrolment numbers.

The national #ScrapTheCap Alliance campaign (opens in a new window) - a body of more than 70 industry and professional groups (led by Universities Australia) representing over 1.6 million professionals working in both education and industry - will need to continue to apply pressure to influence the final outcome, when a formal decision regarding the cap is made following the 7 September 2013 election (delaying potential implementation to 1 July 2015).

Initially the government had anticipated a saving of $520 million by imposing the cap – justified as a measure to combat alleged systemic tax expense claims abuse.

The government’s newly released economic statement notes that the decision to defer the introduction of the cap will allow for further consultation on how best to target excessive claims, while ensuring the impact on university enrolments and genuine professional development is minimised.
The deferred cap decision outcome illustrates the impact of a united front by the higher education sector; with the support of professional and business groups.

"The twelve month deferral represents a temporary but significant reprieve for the hundreds of thousands of people who choose or are required to invest in their own education and professional development," said Belinda Robinson, Chief Executive of peak body, Universities Australia (UA).

According to Ms Robinson, this is good news for Universities who would have suffered due to a projected rise in post-graduate fees and a decline of up to approximately 30% in post-graduate enrolments and professional development programs. She added that "it would reduce national productivity by up to $6 billion per annum and reduce tax revenue by up to $1.5 billion per year.”

"It would exacerbate skills shortages across the board, take us backwards in realising our ambition to become a knowledge nation built on education, skills and innovation, and scotch any aspiration to increase national productivity to 2%.”

Ms Robinson acknowledged the role played by Higher Education Minister Senator Kim Carr and Treasurer Chris Bowen in recognising that a more sophisticated approach to addressing alleged abuses of the taxation system should be explored.

UWS Comment: This deferral decision is great news, given the cap would have undermined UWS's continuing efforts to increase the number and proportion of students who are postgraduate students.

$2,000 self-education cap is a “tax on learning”

Universities Australia (opens in a new window) | Submission to the Treasury Discussion Paper (PDF, 460Kb)(opens in a new window)

On 13 April 2013, the Commonwealth government announced that an annual $2,000 cap on tax deductions on work related self-education was proposed, effective 1 July 2014. The government estimates that the total budget savings will be $514.3 million over the 2014-17 period.

Close to 70 professional groups, representing a wide cross section of the economy, have taken a public stance opposing the proposed cap. The #ScrapTheCap Alliance has tripled in size following its formation after a meeting hosted by Universities Australia on 8 July, and has secured over 20,953 signatures on its website.

Modelling released by Universities Australia suggests that the measure could result in a 30 per cent drop (around 30,000 students) in post-graduate enrolments. The cap will particularly disadvantage some members of the community by deterring those seeking to upgrade their skills and education - examples include mothers returning to work, low SES students and rural areas reliant on health practitioners with broad and up to date skills.

Universities Australia has put forward an alternate proposal to replace the $250 no claim threshold for education expenses with a $90 no claim threshold for all work related expense deductions.

Comment: 
UWS has strongly endorsed the Universities Australia and campaign alliance stance against the proposed $2000 cap. The proposed cap will undermine UWS efforts to improve access to post graduate education across Greater Western Sydney.

Further information: 

Australian Government Research Priorities

Department of Industry, Innovation, Climate Change, Science, Research and Tertiary Education | 21 June 2013 | Strategic Research Priorities (PDF, 154Kb)(opens in a new window)

The Australian Strategic Research Priorities were released on 21 June 2013 by the then Prime Minister, in conjunction with former Minister Emerson, former Minister Farrell and the Chief Scientist – Professor Ian Chubb.

The Report outlines five key societal challenges, which then inform fifteen strategic research priorities (3 priorities per Challenge) in the national interest.

The societal challenges are:
  • Living in a changing environment
  • Promoting population health and wellbeing
  • Managing our food and water assets
  • Securing Australia’s place in a changing world
  • Lifting productivity and economic growth.
The 15 strategic research priorities identified are:
  • Identify vulnerabilities and boundaries to the adaptability of changing natural and human systems
  • Manage risk and capture opportunities for sustainable natural and human systems
  • Enable societal transformation to enhance sustainability and wellbeing
  • Optimise effective delivery of health care and related systems and services
  • Maximise social and economic participation in society
  • Improve the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
  • people
  • Optimise food and fibre production using our land and marine resources
  • Develop knowledge of the changing distribution, connectivity, transformation and sustainable use of water in the Australian landscape
  • Maximise the effectiveness of the production value chain from primary to processed food
  • Improve cyber security for all Australians
  • Manage the flow of goods, information, money and people across our national and international boundaries
  • Understand political, cultural, economic and technological change, particularly in our region
  • Deliver skills for the new economy
  • Maximise Australia's competitive advantage in critical sectors
  • Identify the means by which Australia can lift productivity and economic growth
The Government will apply these priorities to research funding agencies and for the focus of work by government research organisations. Agencies such as the Australian Research Council and the National Health and Medical Research Council have been given until mid-2014 to transition to the new priorities.

For details, please visit the Strategic Research Priorities (opens in a new window) website.

Comment (Professor Andrew Cheetham, Interim Deputy Vice-Chancellor Research): 
From the UWS perspective these 15 priorities are still quite broad and UWS researchers in our Institutes and Schools will connect with many of these priority areas, in particular but not exclusively, researchers in the Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, the Institute for Culture and Society, the Centre for Health Research, the School of Social Science and Psychology and School of Science and Health.

While these priorities are broadly supported by both sides of politics, it remains to be seen how these priorities will translate into funding priorities, and how they will then be implemented at the research funding coalface before we can be sure of where UWS will be able to benefit from and contribute to the National Challenges.

Tony Abbott abandons plan to dump Gonski, for now

The Australian, Justine Ferrari (opens in a new window) | 26 July 2013

A letter was sent to principals of both government and non-government schools across Australia from the Opposition Leader and Mr Pyne. The letter outlines that if there isn't an overwhelming majority of jurisdictions in support of the Better Schools model, the Coalition will put forward legislation to continue the current SES model for one year. If this move is blocked in the Senate, from January 1 2014, non-government schools and States that have agreed to the Better Schools model will commence under the new regime under a Coalition government.

The plan outlined in the letter is a shift away from the Coalition's public position of repealing and scrapping the Gonski model, in recognition that it is unlikely to get changes through the Senate before July 1, while it is controlled by Labor and the Greens. Mr Pyne said the letter was sent to clarify the Coalition's position for schools and ensure they had certainty for the next 12 months.

NSW, South Australia, Tasmania and the ACT have signed up to the funding reforms. The Rudd government has finalised arrangements with independent and Catholic schools in the past two weeks.

Comment:
The National Plan for School Improvement funding model should improve funding for many schools in Greater Western Sydney and help to improve educational outcomes in the region (including the numbers of students who go on to university). 

Don’t rush reform – UA Advise Government

The Australian | 24 July 2013 | Don't rush policy reform, says UA (opens in a new window)
 
Higher Education Minister Kim Carr sought advice from Vice Chancellors at a meeting on 16 July about possible budget-neutral alternatives to the $900 million university funding cuts announced in the May budget. He raised the option of reintroducing some sort of caps on numbers of funded undergraduate student places, which then divided the sector in its views.

Universities Australia publicly commented after the meeting that major policy reform of the demand-driven system cannot be rushed in just 72 hours and needs further consultation to avoid unintended consequences. UA noted that there are two key “threshold” issues: 
  • the proposed cap on self-education expenses for tax deductions should be abandoned and universities should be insulated from further cuts to compensate for that.
  • Any alternative savings identified in the higher education budget should be directed at reducing the proposed “efficiency dividend”.
Comment: 
UWS has opposed the reintroduction of caps on funded places. UWS has publicly supported the demand-driven funding system as essential for addressing the skills shortages and to enable access to education for communities across Greater Western Sydney which have the ability but have previously not been given access to university education.

The impact of schools on young people’s transition to university

National Centre for Vocational Education Research | July 2013 | The impact of schools on young people's transition to university (opens in a new window)

The report uses Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth (LSAY) data to look at the impact of schools on a student’s tertiary entrance rank (TER) and the probability of that student going to university. The report concludes 
  • young people’s individual characteristics are the main drivers of success
  • the characteristics of schools only matter to an extent. School attributes are found to be responsible for almost 20% of the variation in TER scores. The three most important school attributes for TER include sector (Catholic and independent/ government); gender mix (single sex/co-educational) and the extent to which a school is ‘academic’. The socioeconomic status of schools didn’t emerge as a significant influence on TER. 
The probability of going to university is affected by the school, with the most significant school characteristics being: the proportion of non-English speaking background students; the sector; and the socioeconomic make-up of the student body.

Comment: 
This report confirms the range of contextual factors that contribute to a student’s TER and the motivation, barriers and likelihood of students considering university study. As UWS has continued to be successful in attracting a significant proportion of Low SES students, NESB and students from government schools, the findings of this report recognise the important role UWS plays in enabling access to university for these students.

Taking university teaching seriously

Norton, A., Sonnemann, J. and Cherastidtham | Grattan Institute | Taking university teaching seriously (opens in a new window)

The Grattan Report, Taking University Teaching Seriously released 21 July 2013 argues that universities should emphasise the importance of quality of teaching as much as research output. The report argues that currently 
  • teaching quality in universities has received much less public and political attention than the quality of teaching in school
  • universities assign greater levels of prestige, recognition and promotion opportunities for research activities than for teaching excellence
  • this acts as a deterrent for quality teachers entering the sector and discourages staff actively working to improve teaching.
The report notes that the student demand-driven funding system will play a key role in ensuring universities work to raise teaching standards in order to attract students. 

The report recommends: 
  • professionalising university teaching in the long term; 
  • a mid-term solution for the government to fund a competitive fund enabling 10-12 universities to receive funding to engage 2,500 teaching-focused staff at all academic levels.
Comment:
Teaching quality in schools and now in universities is an area of continuing government policy focus.

UWS continues to implement a range of strategies to encourage and promote quality teaching and to recognise and reward good teaching. UWS is fortuitously placed with the quality of our teaching nationally recognised through Professor James Arvanitakis and Professor Roy Tasker winning the 2012 and 2011 Prime Minister's Award for Australian University Teacher of the Year, as well as other OL&T awards and citations. 

UWS should take advantage of any funding if the government adopts the proposal for a competitive funding scheme to support employment of 2,500 teaching-focused staff. 

The myth of markets in school education

Jensen, B., Weidmann, B. and Farmer, J. | Grattan Institute | The myth of markets in school education (opens in a new window)

The myth of markets in school education report by the Grattan Institute (“the Report”) released 10 July 2013, challenges the assumption by policy makers that if autonomy is increased within schools, competitive pressures between schools to retain students will lead to improvements in student performance. The Report concludes:
  • there is no evidence that  market-based and pro-autonomy policies for schools has led to any  increase in student performance
  • not enough schools have local high performing schools able to take on new students and which are affordable. Even when parents have good information about differences between schools, the good ones don’t grow and bad ones don’t shrink.
  • the link between school autonomy and high performance is weak. Victoria, which led the world in increasing autonomy, has not performed above New South Wales, which was centralised until recently.
  • The world’s best systems have varying levels of autonomy but they all articulate the best way to teach and learn, then make sure they have the best teachers to carry it out.
For information only

National Partnership Agreement on Improving Teacher Quality: Performance report for 2012

Report to the Council of Australian Governments | 12 June 2013 | Teacher Quality foundations overwhelmingly achieved (opens in a new window)

The Council’s final assessment report shows States and Territories have achieved 115 out of the 122 milestones but many of these were the minor recommendations.

For information only: 
The report is interesting in providing a national overview on quality teaching strategy broken down by State, however does not have particular implications for UWS. These partnerships agreements were signed off between the Commonwealth and each state and have not involved universities.  

New Health Plan to Help Close the Gap 

The Hon Jenny Macklin MP, Minister for Indigenous Affairs | The Hon Tanya Plibersek MP, Minister for Health |The Hon Warren Snowdon MP, Minister for Indigenous Health | Joint Media Release 23 July 2013 | National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan 2013–2023 (PDF, 17Mb)(opens in a new window)

The Commonwealth Government released the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan – an evidence-based policy framework to guide policies and programs to improve Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health over the next decade. The Health Plan replaces the National Strategic Framework for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health (opens in a new window) which expires in 2013. 

Comment:
This report may be relevant for health research, teaching, and consultancy opportunities for UWS academics. UWS may have an opportunity to engage with the Department of Health and Aging to assist with implementation of the new health plan. 

Overseas students are now better able to afford an Australian university education

International Student Survey 2012 | Australian Education International (AEI) | International  Student Survey 2012 Overview Report April 2013 (PDF, 433Kb)(opens in a new window)

The 2012 International Student Survey Overview Report commissioned by Australian Education International (AEI) found that overseas students are now better able to afford an Australian university education due to the fall in the Australian dollar.

Australia has graduated 2.5 million international students and the international education industry brings $14.5 billion a year to the Australian economy, as “each international student contributes an average of $30,000 to the Australian economy and generates 0.3 full-time equivalent jobs,” says Ms Belinda Robinson, Chief Executive of Universities Australia.
 
International students – key findings: 
87% are very satisfied with their overall experience in Australia 
86% are very satisfied with their study/learning experience in Australia; and 
88% are very satisfied with living in Australia 
 
Top 5 factors that influenced international HE students’ choice to study in Australia:
96% identified quality of teaching
94% identified reputation of a qualification from the institution
93% identified reputation of the institution 
92% identified personal safety; and 
92% identified reputation of Australian education system 
 
Comment: 
The Report reinforces the key impact of the Australian exchange rate on International student university enrolment and has some findings that may be useful for our efforts to attract international students

Making the Most of Your International Student Barometer Data: A Guide to Good Practice

Universities Australia | 10 July, 2013 | Making the Most of Your International Student Barometer Data: A Guide to Good Practice (PDF, 550Kb)(opens in a new window)

Making the Most of Your International Student Barometer Data: A Guide to Good Practice, outlines best practice and strategies to improve international student satisfaction levels across institutions.

Comment:
The guide, through case studies, offers strategies to lift Australian university competitiveness and attract international students and may provide some ideas for UWS strategy and programs.

Science literacy on the decline: survey

Australian Academy of Science | Science literacy in Australia (opens in a new window)

Science literacy on the decline: survey 
Click on image above

A May 2013 survey of Science literacy in Australia, with 1,515 respondents, found that many answered important scientific questions incorrectly and found that science literacy levels amongst young people have declined since the first survey in 2010.

Comment:
The Report confirms the UWS concerns about the levels of science literacy among prospective UWS students and the need to provide preparation and academic support services for the many UWS courses requiring science literacy.

The Gates Effect

University World News | 20 July 2013 | The Gates effect (opens in a new window)

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the world’s largest private grant making foundation, is advocating strongly for competency based education over the credit hour method. Gates has poured hundreds of millions of dollars towards getting more students into, and through, higher education in the United States - with the objective to lift Americans out of poverty.

An area that the Foundation is investing in includes projects to test how massive open online courses (MOOCs) could change introductory and remedial classes.

Comment: 
UWS recognises the importance of utilising technology in higher education. UWS’s Blended Learning strategy will continue to leverage the opportunities provided by technologies to support learners, many of whom are digitally literate, frequent users of mobile devices, and seeking highly interactive, visual, immediate, and socially engaging learning. 

Indian MOOC Partnership to reach up to 150,000

The Economic Times | 20 July 2013 | Industry-ITT MOOC partnership to reach up to 150,000 (opens in a new window)

Seven leading Indian institutes of technology, in partnership with related industry, are uniting to launch an online course that could lead to 100,000 – 150,000 per annum receive free, quality higher education. The course will be offered using the model of massive online courses (MOOCs).

For information.

Mapping the Humanities and Social Sciences in Australia

Senator the Hon. Kim Carr | 26 July 2013 | Mapping the Humanities and Social Sciences in Australia (opens in a new window)

The Australian Government has commissioned a new project to map the national research and teaching capacity in the humanities and social sciences (HASS). The report will profile the HASS sectors, including trends in student enrolments and infrastructure capacity.

The assessment will be undertaken by the Australian Academy of the Humanities and the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, led by Professor Graeme Turner.

In addition to profiling the humanities and social sciences sectors, the project will consider how government, universities and the humanities and social sciences communities might address issues of sustainability and gaps in capability.

For information.

Quality vs quantity – a false dichotomy

Quality vs quantity false dichotomy (PDF, 175Kb)(opens in a new window)(requires staff login) 

Recent media coverage and political debates have questioned whether the quality of university education and student outcomes have been undermined by the significant increase in the number of students enrolling at university (up by over 225,000 p.a  compared with 2008) and by widening participation to enrol more students from low Socioeconomic status (SES) and other disadvantaged backgrounds.

Sector-wide quality indicators have not revealed a decline in student satisfaction levels; success rates; and retention rates. An examination of outcomes nationally and at the University of Western Sydney show that quantity can increase while quality is maintained and enhanced.

See a detailed paper by OHEPP on this issue and another paper on the ATAR  debate.

The Great ATAR Furphy

ATAR Paper (PDF, 388Kb)(opens in a new window)(requires staff login) 

A number of media comments have raised a concern about whether efforts to increase numbers of university students have led universities to lower ATAR entry levels leading to lower academic standards and quality.

The attached OHEPP  paper Does the ATAR Matter? provides an overview of the ATAR Entry system and questions the usefulness of ATAR levels as a predictor of success at university