The Lead Editorial in Today's Australian: "Time to reform higher education". (June 7, 2007)

    Although neither the Federal Minister for Education, Science and Training, Julie Bishop, or Labor's Shadow Minister for Education and Training, Steven Smith were sufficiently interested to attend Group of Eight Chair, Glyn Davis' address to the National Press Club yesterday, Rupert Murdoch's Australian considered it important enough to make it the focus of its lead editorial today.

Taking its cue directly from Professor Davis' remarks it opens with:

Central planning is depriving us of quality universities

WHEN the winds of micro-economic reform began to blow the cobwebs away in the Australian public sector two decades ago, it was unfortunate that higher education was walled off from change. Yet as Australia struggles to meet the shortage of skilled labour, it is time to address the rigidities in the tertiary sector that have rendered it incapable of responding flexibly to meet the demands of the labour market.

 

The Dawkins reforms undertaken two decades ago have imposed a level of centralised control over tertiary education that would warm the heart of a Soviet commissar.

 

[S]tudents and the nation are ultimately losing out from a system that is enforcing uniformity and favouring mediocrity. The Australian has always supported excellence in higher education and places enormous importance on the value of liberal arts education. Similarly, the acute shortage of skilled labour across a number of sectors -- including mining, finance, health and education -- is giving renewed urgency to reform of the tertiary sector.

 

We therefore welcome the proposals of the Group of Eight universities to end the central planning of Australian universities while retaining the system of universal entitlement to an income-contingent loan.

And the broadsheet goes on to support the Go8's recommendations to retain the system of universal entitlement to an income-contingent loan,  to allow students to decide what and where they study, provided they meet entry requirements, to allow universities to be free to alter their offerings to meet demand, and for the price of courses to reflect their real cost.

The paper's editorial writer concludes: "It is time to bite the bullet in this critical area and allow market forces to deliver the world-class tertiary education sector that Australia needs to meet the challenges of the 21st century."

But as seems to be universally the case in the popular media, no reference is made to the role of research at our universities, and this despite the Go8's discussion paper devoting over five pages to the topic.

The discussion paper summarises the Go8's view:

For Australia to achieve and sustain international competitiveness in university research the following principles should guide the development of policy:

• Australia should sustain internationally competitive levels of public investment in research;

•  the dual funding system should be continued for university research – incorporating a balance of competitive grants and institutional block payments;

• competitive funding schemes (of the ARC and the NHMRC) should fund the full cost of sponsored research;

• the maximum possible share of research funding should be allocated on a contestable basis according to reliable measures of research performance;

• funding for research should be distributed in a way that recognises the benefits of critical mass in the research environment;

• while research block grants should be driven by the quality of research performance, institutions should be free to invest these funds according to their individual strategic missions;

• there should be strong incentives for industry investment in research, targeted to maximise additionality;

• research training policy should be driven by student choice and encourage mobility of research students;

• research training must occur only in areas where research is being performed at the highest levels of quality; and

• funding to support research training activities should reflect the actual costs of providing training in different disciplines.

Will the Go8's discussion paper have a significant positive impact impact, will The Australian's editorial make a difference?