Over recent weeks, MB has presented data from the Department of Education showing how academic (teaching) staff ratios at Australia’s universities has fallen badly behind booming international student enrolments, whose numbers have ballooned by nearly 300,000 since 2013:
Despite the many billions of dollars of fees brought in from international students, Australia’s universities have spent the lion’s share of this windfall on padding their administrations (bureaucracies), rather than increasing their academic staff. This is encapsulated in the below table derived from Department of Education data:
Accordingly, the ratio of students to academic staff at Australia’s universities has materially worsened, increasing from 20.05 in 2009 to 21.44 in 2017:
Ironically, the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA) explicitly stipulates that the student-to-staff ratio at Australian English language courses must not exceed 18:1 – well below the average level at Australia’s universities:
What is the required staff-to-student ratio?
The required staff-to-student ratio is indicated in Standard 14 of the National Code 2018, which states:
‘The registered provider must have and implement policies and procedures to ensure its staffing resources are adequate and have the capabilities as required by the quality assurance framework applying to the course. Where the course provided by the registered provider is not subject to an appropriate quality assurance framework, the registered provider must have and implement appropriate documented policies and processes for the recruitment, induction, performance assessment and ongoing development of members of staff involved with the recruitment or delivery of education or client services to students.’
The staff-to-student ratio for the teaching of ELICOS should not exceed 1:18 per class.
Therefore, academic staff at Australia’s universities are having to deal with many international students struggling to learn English and the content of their degree concurrently. In addition to placing increased strain on teaching staff, this is degrading education quality for both international and domestic students alike, as revealed in the recent Four Corners “Cash Cows” report:
Academics and students are speaking out to reveal a picture, across the nation, of compromised academic standards.
“Many students seemed to be unable to understand instructions or understand the material that was put in front of them.” Academic
“I would do my best to make sure that the team would understand the topic each week, and then I would get them to send to me what they had written, and I would try and rephrase it into more readable English.” Student
Domestic students aren’t the only ones feeling frustrated. Some international students, who have often sacrificed everything to be here, are not getting the education they have been promised.
The sad reality is that Australia’s university system has been commercialised and has shifted focus from higher learning towards higher earning. Front-line staff have been cut and standards trashed, while senior administrators make like bandits paying themselves obscene salaries.
