Sydney Morning Herald's Matt Thompson Analyses Problems Facing Australia's University Sector. (October 5, 2004)

    The Herald's Matt Thomson looks at some of the problems currently confronting Australia's universities and he brings out some salient points. For example, "Universities are required to undergo 'quality audits' every five years by the Australian Universities Quality Agency. But critics say that the agency focuses on 'process' - examining an institution's procedures and adherence to its corporate mission - rather than assessing the quality of teaching and research." Which is precisely the point brought up by the Vice-Chancellor of ANU, Ian Chubb, as one of the principle reasons for his administration allocating over $500,000 to institute an independent critical review of his university's research and teaching prowess.

Thompson was told by the principal policy adviser at Griffith University, Gavin Moodie, that the universities are shy of being evaluated against one another with regard to the quality of the degrees they confer, and went so far as to say, "nobody is interested in standards".

Leaving aside the matter as to whether or not it makes sense to attempt, as Moodie suggests, to develop bureaucratic assessments of quality across disciplines, i.e. is a Sydney University engineering degree as good as its degree in classics, Thompson addresses the matter that Australian universities traditionally require their academics to perform both teaching and research, "which can lead to mediocrity in both areas" or so he reports is "the view of David Lloyd, the chief executive of the six-year-old Melbourne University Private." But such a view seems to miss the point that it's not a matter of them doing both but rather that the Australian universities place such a heavy teaching load on many of their academic staff that they are not in a position to undertake meaningful research. It's the active researcher who can tell it like it is.

Finally, Thompson reiterates the appalling decline in federal government support for our public universities, "The proportion of university funding from the Commonwealth has rapidly declined since the early 1990s. Figures from the Vice-Chancellors' Committee show that student fees will next year contribute more than 22 per cent of total operating grants, up from less than 6 per cent in 1992." To overcome the shortfall he implies that looking to federal sources to redress the decline is hopeless, universities must look to awaking a philanthropic urge in the population, citing Harvard's $28 billion endowment, but neglecting that of the world's top 25 research universities four are public University of California campuses. Indeed 11 of the top 25 are public institutions and not even Stanford, (placed 2) has anything like Harvard's endowment.

Note: As FY 2004, the value of Stanford University's endowment was US$8.6 (A$11.9) billion while Harvard University's was valued at US$22.6 (A$31.4) billion.