AUSTRALIA: Divisions surface as review begins

Higher education in Australia is undergoing a wide-ranging review commissioned by the new Labor government. As the latest in a long line of investigations over the past two decades, this one was announced in March by Education Minister Julia Gillard. It is focusing on the future direction of higher education, its 'fitness for purpose' in meeting the needs of the Australian community and economy, and the options for ongoing reform.

The four-member review panel is headed by a former vice-chancellor of the University of South Australia, Professor Denise Bradley, who has been asked to report on 'priority action' by October with a final report due before the end of the year.

Gillard said the review would examine the current state of Australian higher education against international best practice and assess whether it was capable of contributing to the innovation and productivity gains required for long-term economic development and growth.

The panel is to advise the government on possible key objectives for higher education by focusing on a set of 'themes' and describing how the objectives could be achieved through reform of the sector and changes to regulation and funding. The themes include developing a diverse, globally focused and competitive higher education sector with quality, responsive institutions following clear, distinctive missions.

Welcoming the review, the vice-chancellors' collective, Universities Australia, said it shared the government's desire for a new direction in higher education policy. Chief executive Dr Glenn Withers said the review would need to be consistent with the government's parallel inquiry into innovation and should ensure an examination of funding arrangements would include private and public contributions and how these compared with other OECD countries.

"This review... should not distract from the need to address very immediate needs of the university sector including income support for students already in the system," Withers said. "Such needs can be addressed now without prejudicing the outcomes of either the review or the government's wider economic and social goals. Indeed there is much that universities can do to assist even more with these goals and in the immediate future."

But tensions between the different university groupings that comprise Australian higher education are likely to become more marked as the review presses on with its task. The Group of Eight research intensive universities has been pressing for a greater emphasis on funding for research, research training and research infrastructure, while those outside the group see this as a grab for an even greater share of federal grant money.

In a commentary on the review, the group's executive officer, Michael Gallagher, admitted that any call for more money by the group would lead to 'predictable squabbling'. But Gallagher said there was a major challenge to policy in Australia, as in Britain, given the failure to elaborate on the role of less research intensive universities.

"So where do we go next?" he asked. "Should government designate institutional types or let the market sort that out through some sort of Darwinian process? Neither is realistic. Rather I think we need to look for a new balance of incentives involving a combination of wider market competition and appropriate state steering.

"In Australia, just as we cannot go backwards from market mechanisms to models of central control, so we cannot unscramble the omelette of the unitary system of higher education. It is too late and too politically contentious even to try. Anyway, thinking in terms of government designation of provider types is outmoded and static in an environment where changes in learner demand and technological capacity are driving changes in supply."

Gallagher said the main policy option was to develop a more contemporary approach that conceived of universities dynamically adapting to academic business opportunities while encouraging competition among institutions of a similar type, to widen the variation in mission, operation, reputation and price. "Australia must rely on competition within a model that does not arbitrarily limit institutional possibilities. That is a major advantage of a unitary structure but it may take us only so far in what is by world standards a small market. We are more likely to see diversity flourish when we address policy comprehensively across the whole tertiary sector, including institutional accreditation, financing mechanisms and student income support."

geoff.maslen@uw-news.com