Written by Dr Tim Pitman for The Conversation
Melbourne University’s Vice-Chancellor Glyn Davis has called on the federal government to reform the university funding system and allow universities to “decide their own student profiles within the funding envelope”.
“Decide student profiles” sounds better than “restricting access” and “within the funding envelope” certainly sounds more agreeable than “cutting higher education funding” but they amount to the same thing.
If Davis’ suggestion is taken up by the government, there will be significant consequences with regards to who will be able to get into university and what they will be able to study. The current uncapped system, where there are no set limits on how many student places the government will fund, has many benefits, including increasing the supply of graduates to Australia’s economy, greater student choice, and improving access to higher education for disadvantaged groups.
