News & Views item - July 2005 |
Analysis of Trends in Science Tertiary Education 2001 - 2004. (July 28, 2005)
The Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies' (FASTS) Executive Director, Bradley Smith, has made available an analysis of trends in tertiary science education from 2001 - 2004 in order to update the comprehensive Australian Council of Deans of Science (ACDS) report of 2003 which examines data from 1989 2002.
The table of the analysis, in pdf format, is available online (click here). It tabulates total domestic student load from 2001-2004 expressed as effective fulltime student load (EFTSU).
Bradley Smith points out that in the annual data sets compiled by the Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST) it tabulates effective full time student load in disciplinary subjects or units not courses. For example, if a student doing an engineering degree in 2004 did 2 subjects in physics, 1 in maths and 2 in engineering, he or she would be counted in the 2004 data as 0.4 in physics, 0.2 in maths and 0.4 in the relevant engineering subject(s)
In addition DEST changed the definitions of subjects beginning in 2001. As a result, it is not possible to provide robust trend analyses for specific disciplines that cross over the 1989 - 2000 and post 2001 data.
The new data are essentially in agreement with the the trends reported in various ACDS and DEST publications. The ACDS report is available at http://www.acds.edu.au/occas.htm.
FASTS' Executive Director summarises his analysis:
In brief, between 2001 and 2004 --
total domestic load for bachelor degrees dropped for mathematics (5.4%), Physics (2.44%), earth sciences (11.87%) and
increased in biology (5.26%), chemistry (2.05%) and other natural and physical sciences (20.69%).
Total domestic science bachelor degrees increased by 1.02% whereas total domestic bachelors across all disciplines increased 2.69%.
Total domestic science load (postgraduate and undergraduate) increased by 2.68% compared to increase of 4.35% for total domestic load (postgraduate and undergrad) across all disciplines.
Sciences' share of the total domestic student load fell from 13.19% in 2001 to 12.98% in 2004. This equates to a loss of 1031 students (EFTSU) had the share been maintained.
From the viewpoint of the Federal
Government's "Backing Australia's Ability" initiative, this aspect appears less
than effective.