Higher Education Review Process
Higher Education at the Crossroads: An Overview Paper
attachment b
main policy developments of the last thirty years
b1 Commonwealth
Government involvement in higher education funding and policy increased
substantially in the post-World War II period. In 1974 the Commonwealth and
State Governments agreed to abolish tuition fees at universities and
colleges of advanced education and that the Commonwealth would assume
effectively full financial responsibility for higher education in Australia
(although all but national institutions have continued to operate under
State and Territory legislation). The Government also introduced a
means-tested allowance for eligible full-time students, the Tertiary
Education Assistance Scheme.
b2 Government
funding for research, and funding per equivalent full-time student,
particularly in the form of capital grants, declined significantly over the
next decade. This prompted a rationalisation of the advanced education
sector. As colleges of advanced education began to offer more degree and
postgraduate level courses and competed with universities for funds and
students, the ‘binary divide’ between universities and other higher
education institutions established in 1965 began to dissolve.
b3 Further
mechanisms of coordination and regulation were applied to the higher
education sector in the 1970s. In addition to formal government structures
such as the Tertiary Education Commission, created in 1977, other bodies and
individuals began to participate in the formulation of higher education
policy. The recession of the early 1980s, combined with a rise in
enrolments, placed a strain on higher education institutions. Although the
initiatives in the mid-seventies increased the participation rates of people
over 25 years of age (particularly women), indigenous students, certain
migrant groups, people in remote localities and people with disabilities
continued to be significantly under-represented.
b4 From 1983 to
1987 the principal policy focus of Government in higher education was access
and equity. Some growth in participation combined with measures to increase
efficiency and effectiveness, including rationalisation and reallocation of
resources, were directed principally toward giving effect to equity
objectives.
b5 In 1987 a major
reform process was set in train by the Commonwealth culminating in the White
Paper, Higher Education: A Policy Statement (July 1988). The stated
objectives of the new policies were to increase opportunities for
participation in higher education, make the sector more responsive to
national social, cultural and, especially, economic requirements and to
provide a more flexible environment for institutions to operate in.
b6 The principal
reforms were:
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Major expansion in student
places.
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Introduction of rolling
triennial funding arrangements with operating funds allocated as a
single block grant rather than multiple specific purpose elements.
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Introduction of new
programmes to increase equity.
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Abolition of the binary
divide between universities and other higher education institutions
such as Colleges of Advanced Education and creation of a ‘Unified
National System’. Associated with this was a major programme of
amalgamations and rationalisations resulting in significantly fewer
higher education institutions.
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Establishment of the annual
profiles documentation and meetings process as a mechanism by which
institutions and the Commonwealth negotiate and agree on key
allocation and performance objectives and targets and exchange views
and information on broad strategic and policy issues.
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Increased targeting of
research funds to reward excellence.
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Increased flexibility for
institutions as regards staffing, notably salary payments.
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Encouragement to
institutions to become more entrepreneurial and attract more
non-Commonwealth income.
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Establishment of the
advisory and consultative body, the National Board of Employment,
Education and Training (NBEET) with subordinate Councils, including
the Higher Education Council and the Australian Research Council. This
was abolished formally on 1 July 2001. However, NBEET and its Councils
(other than the ARC and HEC) effectively ceased operations in mid
1996.
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Encouragement of
improvements in institutional planning, management and governance.
b7 The commitment
to large scale growth in participation and the consequent funding
implications led to a review of funding and, ultimately, to the
establishment of the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS). This was,
in effect, a move to a user pays principle, but with a strong equity
dimension through the facility for students to pay their contribution
through an income contingent loans scheme with no real rate of interest.
While successive governments have since modified various elements of HECS,
the scheme has remained unchanged in its basic principles since its
introduction in 1989.
b8 The period from
1989 to 1996 was characterised by the implementation of the above reforms
and expansion of the sector followed by refinement and consolidation. The
Government statement, Higher Education: Quality and Diversity in the
1990s,
was released in 1991. The statement led to the introduction of external
quality audits of institutions by the new Committee for Quality Assurance in
Higher Education. The process was designed to enhance quality of teaching
and research while maintaining and extending diversity by avoiding pressures
towards a culture of compliance to government prescriptions. The process was
discontinued in 1996.
b9 The 1991 statement
also placed new emphasis on the need for the sector to embrace the potential
of technology and committed government to facilitating improvement in
awareness, knowledge, skills and best practice to that end. In 1993 (based
on a two year pilot that began in 1991) a consortium of institutions
established Open Universities Australia, a highly flexible off campus learning
option in which OLA acts as a broker between students and providers of
course units and awards.
b10 In the late 1980s
institutions could charge fees for a limited range of non-award and
postgraduate courses designed for upgrading qualifications. In 1994 the
Government removed restrictions on the numbers of postgraduate places
institutions could offer and on the fees they could charge for non HECS-liable
postgraduate places. The current arrangements for fee paying overseas
students were introduced in 1990 after a full fee programme was introduced
alongside a limited programme for part subsidised overseas students in 1985.
b11 Following a change of
Government in 1996 significant policy and funding changes were introduced,
most to commence from 1997. The principal changes were:
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Substantial changes to
financial elements of HECS, though not to its key features. The
changes reflected more appropriately the balance of public and private
returns to higher education, the relative costs of courses and earning
potential of graduates in particular fields and as with changes
earlier in the decade, sought to recover debt more quickly.
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Authorisation of
institutions to charge fees, from 1998, to non-overseas undergraduate
students once the institution had delivered all Commonwealth funded
places and subject to other stringent conditions. This brought options
for Australian students more into line with those for overseas
students.
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Marginal funding (at the
discounted minimum HECS rate), from 1998, for HECS-liable
undergraduate places above an institution’s Commonwealth
undergraduate target.
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Reductions in the Forward
Estimates for institutions’ Operating Grants from 1997 to 2000 as an
efficiency dividend (6 per cent over the four years) and a
commensurate reduction of their Commonwealth targets but with
undergraduate places protected from reductions.
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Increases in the Forward
Estimates for targeted research (increases of $22.4 million,
$50 million and $69.1 million in 1997, 1998 and 1999. An
additional $129.3 million in total for research).
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Renewed emphasis was placed
on the need for institutions to attract non-Commonwealth income.
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A commitment to consult the
sector on the best way to integrate government planning and
accountability requirements and to achieve a more strategic,
streamlined relationship between the government and the sector with
less onerous reporting requirements.
b12 In 1999 (the
legislation was passed in December 1998), for the first time, a private
self-accrediting institution, the University of Notre Dame Australia, was
added to the list of institutions able to access the full range of benefits
available under HEFA while not being constrained by the limitations on
fee-paying applying to the other institutions similarly listed. That said,
the UNDA is established by legislation while the Australian Catholic
University, which has been funded under HEFA since its inception, is
established under company law not by statute.
b13 In December 1999 the
Government issued a White Paper on research and research training, Knowledge
and Innovation, following extensive consultations. The process resulted in a
new framework providing for:
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A strengthened ARC and an
invigorated national competitive grants system;
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Performance-based funding
for research student places and research infrastructure;
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Establishment of a broad
verification framework through Research and Research Training
Management Plans; and
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A collaborative research
programme to address the needs of rural and regional communities.
b14 The White Paper
having established the broad framework for research and research training in
higher education, the Government, in January 2001, announced a major
Innovation Action Plan, Backing Australia’s Ability. This increased
funding generally by $2.9 billion over five years and in higher
education by $1.47 billion. This included funding for a doubling of ARC
competitive grants, increased project-specific and systemic infrastructure
grants, 2000 additional university places rising to 5 500 as students
continue through their studies and an income contingent loans scheme for
non-research, fee-paying postgraduate students.
b15 The process for
allocation of the 2000 additional places for 2002 for the first time
involved a competitive tendering process and retention of the places by
successful bidders subject to meeting performance criteria. A number of new
regional places were allocated for 2002 following the calling of tenders
from institutions interested in delivering places in Geraldton, Western
Australia.
b16 Meanwhile, in 2000,
the Commonwealth and State Governments agreed on a national Higher Education
Quality Assurance Framework. Two key features of the framework are:
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The establishment of an
independent Australian Universities Quality Agency to conduct quality
audits of institutions, publish reports on its audits, report on
criteria for accreditation of new universities and non-university
higher education awards and reporting on the relative standards and
international standing of the higher education system and its quality
assurance processes; and
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The National
Protocols for Higher Education Approval Processes to ensure consistent
quality assurance criteria and standards across Australia.
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