A new Discussion Paper by The Australia Institute concludes it’s time for a major shake-up in the way they are run.

Australian universities are overseen by Vice-Chancellors who are paid vast sums of money, yet they are presiding over a sector which is failing staff, students and the broader community.

Australian uni students are paying more than ever for degrees while staff-to-student ratios are soaring.

For example, degrees in areas like Law, Society and Culture are 700% more expensive than they were in 1990 (the year after the HECS/HELP scheme was introduced), while staff-to-student ratios have gone from 1-to13 in 1990 to more than 1-to-22 today.

Professor John Quiggin, Professor of Economics at the University of Queensland, suggests seven key reforms:

• Creating a national system of university education managed by the federal government
• Ending the corporate model of governance and refocusing on education/research
• Guaranteeing access to university education
• Promoting co-operation, not competition
• Federal control over international student admissions
• Returning to the collegial model of academic governance
• Creating a central system of sector-wide bargaining for the university sector

“Australia’s universities are plagued with scandal and failing dismally,” said Professor John Quiggin, Professor of Economics at The University of Queensland and author of the report.

“Under the current governance structure, neither the federal nor state governments are properly accountable for Australia’s tertiary sector.

“Universities are treated as a disjointed set of quasi-private enterprises expected to compete against one another in a ‘market’ for higher education. Universities are not businesses and should not be treated as such.

“The entire sector is in a governance crisis, fuelled by a lack of accountability to staff, students and government.

“But, taking the right lessons from international experience, Australia can build an equitable university sector that treats education and research as a public good.”