Please don't tell me they're cutting gender studies courses.

Won't somebody think of the trannies!

I reckon the local students will be very happy to not be chucked into group work sessions with Chinese students who have terrible English and had to carry them.

Select to expand quote

Brent in Qld said..

TonyAbbott said..

Brent in Qld said..

TonyAbbott said..
The skilled worker importing thingy is gamed to get cheap workers in. Not always, but often.

I'm not allowed onto uni campuses anymore. My talks always get cancelled due to threats of marxists violence, and that's just the staff, the students are even worse.

Unis need to cancel cancel culture.

Predictable political beat up as a response and in true political style, avoids answering the simplest of questions with redirection & humbug. Well I suppose the unis got one thing right, they cancelled your 'talks'.

Do you have a question?

Dear Mr Abbott,

I formally apologize and admit the original question would have been easily misunderstood. With hindsight it appeared highly complex with confusing overlaps of time, place & memory requiring detailed interpretation. But I digress, let me put forward the original question in its fundamental form.

When was the last time you stepped foot on a campus of learning? Of any level?

Kind regards

Brent in Qld

Friday

Select to expand quote

TonyAbbott said..

Brent in Qld said..

TonyAbbott said..

Brent in Qld said..

TonyAbbott said..
The skilled worker importing thingy is gamed to get cheap workers in. Not always, but often.

I'm not allowed onto uni campuses anymore. My talks always get cancelled due to threats of marxists violence, and that's just the staff, the students are even worse.

Unis need to cancel cancel culture.

Predictable political beat up as a response and in true political style, avoids answering the simplest of questions with redirection & humbug. Well I suppose the unis got one thing right, they cancelled your 'talks'.

Do you have a question?

Dear Mr Abbott,

I formally apologize and admit the original question would have been easily misunderstood. With hindsight it appeared highly complex with confusing overlaps of time, place & memory requiring detailed interpretation. But I digress, let me put forward the original question in its fundamental form.

When was the last time you stepped foot on a campus of learning? Of any level?

Kind regards

Brent in Qld

Friday

Brent, you didn't really expect an honest sensible reply did you?

Select to expand quote

UncleBob said..

TonyAbbott said..

Brent in Qld said..

TonyAbbott said..

Brent in Qld said..

TonyAbbott said..
The skilled worker importing thingy is gamed to get cheap workers in. Not always, but often.

I'm not allowed onto uni campuses anymore. My talks always get cancelled due to threats of marxists violence, and that's just the staff, the students are even worse.

Unis need to cancel cancel culture.

Predictable political beat up as a response and in true political style, avoids answering the simplest of questions with redirection & humbug. Well I suppose the unis got one thing right, they cancelled your 'talks'.

Do you have a question?

Dear Mr Abbott,

I formally apologize and admit the original question would have been easily misunderstood. With hindsight it appeared highly complex with confusing overlaps of time, place & memory requiring detailed interpretation. But I digress, let me put forward the original question in its fundamental form.

When was the last time you stepped foot on a campus of learning? Of any level?

Kind regards

Brent in Qld

Friday

Brent, you didn't really expect an honest sensible reply did you?

honest sensible reply,
honest sensible reply

that I am afraid does not and cannot exist on Seabreeze

Hey FN ....................... just to put your mind at rest, it has become a major industry. The basic economics of it at the institution level are that the full fee paying students are subsidising the education of Australian residents, like you or I. Outside the institutions, they are pumping millions into the economy. It's big business and there are many Aussies who benefit from it.

The subsidy must be too small to ensure that local students get adequate education. Correct grammar in the previous post would be "...like you or me", not "you or I". To check, read the sentence without including "you". It sounds silly if it ends with I rather than me.

grammar.yourdictionary.com/style-and-usage/when-to-use-i-or-me-in-a-sentence.html

Select to expand quote

Paddles B'mere said..
Hey FN ....................... just to put your mind at rest, it has become a major industry. The basic economics of it at the institution level are that the full fee paying students are subsidising the education of Australian residents, like you or I. Outside the institutions, they are pumping millions into the economy. It's big business and there are many Aussies who benefit from it.

I think it was on 4 corners that I was watching and it said that full fee students were 6% back on 1990 and now account for more than 26%.

That's not a bad thing, but I hope they are not forgetting that the foreign students are supposed to be subsidising the local students not replacing them or acting as a huge profit centre.

Back in the 1990s there was some additional entrance point allowance they gave to students that were local to the area, but I wonder if now they just open it up to anyone?

I am sure many people benefit from it, but if people in the economy are talking about shortages of various skills here then they should also ensure that the university places are there to allow the shortage to be filled.

As far as I'm aware FN pretty much any adult resident can get a government subsidised place at an Australian university. I've been retraining for a different career over the last five years and I just applied and got a place studying externally/online no problems at all.

Select to expand quote

KelpoS said..
I reckon the local students will be very happy to not be chucked into group work sessions with Chinese students who have terrible English and had to carry them.

My kid drops his mates to go join the Chinese groups for assignments. He reckons its a guaranteed "A" grade.

Select to expand quote

FormulaNova said..

Paddles B'mere said..
Hey FN ....................... just to put your mind at rest, it has become a major industry. The basic economics of it at the institution level are that the full fee paying students are subsidising the education of Australian residents, like you or I. Outside the institutions, they are pumping millions into the economy. It's big business and there are many Aussies who benefit from it.

I think it was on 4 corners that I was watching and it said that full fee students were 6% back on 1990 and now account for more than 26%.

That's not a bad thing, but I hope they are not forgetting that the foreign students are supposed to be subsidising the local students not replacing them or acting as a huge profit centre.

Back in the 1990s there was some additional entrance point allowance they gave to students that were local to the area, but I wonder if now they just open it up to anyone?

I am sure many people benefit from it, but if people in the economy are talking about shortages of various skills here then they should also ensure that the university places are there to allow the shortage to be filled.

The most valuable courses (except law) seem to be full of Asian kids who are a blend of local and international students. It would be interesting to know, but I assume, there are a certain allocation to locals and international. You'd hate to think that international students get preference because they are paying - Im sure we will never really know though...

Select to expand quote

Main said..

FormulaNova said..

Paddles B'mere said..
Hey FN ....................... just to put your mind at rest, it has become a major industry. The basic economics of it at the institution level are that the full fee paying students are subsidising the education of Australian residents, like you or I. Outside the institutions, they are pumping millions into the economy. It's big business and there are many Aussies who benefit from it.

I think it was on 4 corners that I was watching and it said that full fee students were 6% back on 1990 and now account for more than 26%.

That's not a bad thing, but I hope they are not forgetting that the foreign students are supposed to be subsidising the local students not replacing them or acting as a huge profit centre.

Back in the 1990s there was some additional entrance point allowance they gave to students that were local to the area, but I wonder if now they just open it up to anyone?

I am sure many people benefit from it, but if people in the economy are talking about shortages of various skills here then they should also ensure that the university places are there to allow the shortage to be filled.

The most valuable courses (except law) seem to be full of Asian kids who are a blend of local and international students. It would be interesting to know, but I assume, there are a certain allocation to locals and international. You'd hate to think that international students get preference because they are paying - Im sure we will never really know though...

I hope that they set a certain number of places aside for external students and then internal students, but I agree, its unlikely we would ever know.

There does seem to be a big opening up of Unis though, so there must be funding somewhere. Perhaps only for full-fee paying students? I know it is very easy to sign up to some of the online course, but I think they are full fee paying, even though its for locals too.

It's actually easy to get the facts on questions like that.

www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-17/removing-cap-on-students-increased-drop-out-rates-report-finds/11215012

Select to expand quote

Mr Milk said..
It's actually easy to get the facts on questions like that.

www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-17/removing-cap-on-students-increased-drop-out-rates-report-finds/11215012

I hope you are not hinting that I should look up this stuff myself! I am too lazy for this, and never finished my degree either

A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. Deferred loan payments seem innocuous while at low levels, but provide levers to hike contributions into the future. This threatens to blow up with (the real) Tony Abbott's government's deregulation proposals c. 2014 (or thereabouts), and this is unlikely to be the last time full fee deregulation will be mooted. At the same time, a series of conservative governments (beginning with Howard) progressively defund higher education through a series of "efficiency dividends" (or cuts in any normal person's language). This has the dual effect of driving up HECS and causing unis to turn to full fee paying overseas students in massive numbers to meet funding shortfalls. The biggest market for this so far has been China, and unis have not been able to diversify sufficiently in their overseas catchment to mitigate risk, simply because China is pretty much the only game in town when it comes to the required economies of scale to make cross subsidisation of Australian students' education by full fee paying overseas students work. Fast forward to 2020 and the folly of this is revealed when the unimaginable happens: a global pandemic. Now the tap has been turned off, possibly permanently, certainly for some time to come. While the Morison government acts swiftly to protect a number of areas of business across the Australian economy, and rightly so, it fails conspicuously to offer anything to assist the tertiary sector--precisely zero. The prime minister's succinct message to those same foreign students who the policy of his predecessors have made the bedrock of tertiary education funding in this country is (and I quote): "Go home." Now education minister Dan Tehan (Bachelor of Arts, Melbourne University, completed prior to introduction of HECS) proposes to adjust the funding mix under the guise of sending a price signal which is intended to funnel students to into degrees (obviouly not BAs) that prepare them for "the jobs of the future" (apparently, minister Tehan knows what these will be, insights possibly facilitated by the critical thinking skills developed during his BA studies). Analysis of the figures of this new funding mix show that, with reduction of fees for STEM there will be, in real terms, a DECREASE in funding for these courses on a per capita basis, a decrease which will still not be ameliorated by more than doubling the cost of a humanities degree. But, this turns out be be clever politics. Not only will humanities graduates partially cross subsidise their STEM colleagues, also the predictable uproar from some quarters over the humanities fee hike will come to be understood historically (if there are any historians left to understand it) as a cynical smokescreen created by the government to deflect attention from the main game: further defunding of tertiary education, at the very time the sector finds itself in the most critical moment of its existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

Select to expand quote

musorianin said..
A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. Deferred loan payments seem innocuous while at low levels, but provide levers to hike contributions into the future. This threatens to blow up with (the real) Tony Abbott's government's deregulation proposals c. 2014 (or thereabouts), and this is unlikely to be the last time full fee deregulation will be mooted. At the same time, a series of conservative governments (beginning with Howard) progressively defund higher education through a series of "efficiency dividends" (or cuts in any normal person's language). This has the dual effect of driving up HECS and causing unis to turn to full fee paying overseas students in massive numbers to meet funding shortfalls. The biggest market for this so far has been China, and unis have not been able to diversify sufficiently in their overseas catchment to mitigate risk, simply because China is pretty much the only game in town when it comes to the required economies of scale to make cross subsidisation of Australian students' education by full fee paying overseas students work.

Fast forward to 2020 and the folly of this is revealed when the unimaginable happens: a global pandemic. Now the tap has been turned off, possibly permanently, certainly for some time to come. While the Morison government acts swiftly to protect a number of areas of business across the Australian economy, and rightly so, it fails conspicuously to offer anything to assist the tertiary sector--precisely zero. The prime minister's succinct message to those same foreign students who the policy of his predecessors have made the bedrock of tertiary education funding in this country is (and I quote): "Go home." Now education minister Dan Tehan (Bachelor of Arts, Melbourne University, completed prior to introduction of HECS) proposes to adjust the funding mix under the guise of sending a price signal which is intended to funnel students to into degrees (obviouly not BAs) that prepare them for "the jobs of the future" (apparently, minister Tehan knows what these will be, insights possibly facilitated by the critical thinking skills developed during his BA studies). Analysis of the figures of this new funding mix show that, with reduction of fees for STEM there will be, in real terms, a DECREASE in funding for these courses on a per capita basis, a decrease which will still not be ameliorated by more than doubling the cost of a humanities degree. But, this turns out be be clever politics.

Not only will humanities graduates partially cross subsidise their STEM colleagues, also the predictable uproar from some quarters over the humanities fee hike will come to be understood historically (if there are any historians left to understand it) as a cynical smokescreen created by the government to deflect attention from the main game: further defunding of tertiary education, at the very time the sector finds itself in the most critical moment of its existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

I am not sure you care about it, but thank you for your contribution. Its good to hear from someone that works in the space.

I have to say I am not a fan of the "Go home" response either. For different although similar reasons. I think its not a practical thing for a lot of people to do, and not a good choice even if they can. It would be better to fund them for at least a while as that money is just going to turn over in the community anyway, which at the moment is a great thing.

Yes it is hard to decipher that while all of our honourable representatives, with no consequence to there financial background went to uni courtesy of the Aussie tax payer ( unless they studied overseas) have been trying to dictate a user pay model ??? And on the other hand say we need a smarter population for the jobs of the future ???

Select to expand quote

musorianin said..
A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

You're out by 10 years. Dawkins was Hawke's minister. Reforms were 88/89. By the late 90s, Howard was in charge.
I assume you don't teach history/politics

Let's also consider these snippets; Education was the 3rd largest source of income at, I think, $60B. It has gone.
Most of the Chinese students here had every intention of applying to stay permanently upon graduation. Many of them would have been successful.

Select to expand quote

Mr Milk said..

musorianin said..
A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

You're out by 10 years. Dawkins was Hawke's minister. Reforms were 88/89. By the late 90s, Howard was in charge.
I assume you don't teach history/politics

I was at uni in the early 90s, but i think it wasnt yet unsubsidised. They only brought in hecs a few years before i think.

Select to expand quote

Mr Milk said..

musorianin said..
A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

You're out by 10 years. Dawkins was Hawke's minister. Reforms were 88/89. By the late 90s, Howard was in charge.
I assume you don't teach history/politics

You'll allow me a typo perhaps, that was done on my phone; correct, I meant to write "late 1980s." Mea culpa. Aside from the proof reading and cheap shot about what I may or may not teach, do you have a point of substance about what I wrote?

Select to expand quote

FormulaNova said..

musorianin said..
A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. Deferred loan payments seem innocuous while at low levels, but provide levers to hike contributions into the future. This threatens to blow up with (the real) Tony Abbott's government's deregulation proposals c. 2014 (or thereabouts), and this is unlikely to be the last time full fee deregulation will be mooted. At the same time, a series of conservative governments (beginning with Howard) progressively defund higher education through a series of "efficiency dividends" (or cuts in any normal person's language). This has the dual effect of driving up HECS and causing unis to turn to full fee paying overseas students in massive numbers to meet funding shortfalls. The biggest market for this so far has been China, and unis have not been able to diversify sufficiently in their overseas catchment to mitigate risk, simply because China is pretty much the only game in town when it comes to the required economies of scale to make cross subsidisation of Australian students' education by full fee paying overseas students work.

Fast forward to 2020 and the folly of this is revealed when the unimaginable happens: a global pandemic. Now the tap has been turned off, possibly permanently, certainly for some time to come. While the Morison government acts swiftly to protect a number of areas of business across the Australian economy, and rightly so, it fails conspicuously to offer anything to assist the tertiary sector--precisely zero. The prime minister's succinct message to those same foreign students who the policy of his predecessors have made the bedrock of tertiary education funding in this country is (and I quote): "Go home." Now education minister Dan Tehan (Bachelor of Arts, Melbourne University, completed prior to introduction of HECS) proposes to adjust the funding mix under the guise of sending a price signal which is intended to funnel students to into degrees (obviouly not BAs) that prepare them for "the jobs of the future" (apparently, minister Tehan knows what these will be, insights possibly facilitated by the critical thinking skills developed during his BA studies). Analysis of the figures of this new funding mix show that, with reduction of fees for STEM there will be, in real terms, a DECREASE in funding for these courses on a per capita basis, a decrease which will still not be ameliorated by more than doubling the cost of a humanities degree. But, this turns out be be clever politics.

Not only will humanities graduates partially cross subsidise their STEM colleagues, also the predictable uproar from some quarters over the humanities fee hike will come to be understood historically (if there are any historians left to understand it) as a cynical smokescreen created by the government to deflect attention from the main game: further defunding of tertiary education, at the very time the sector finds itself in the most critical moment of its existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

I am not sure you care about it, but thank you for your contribution. Its good to hear from someone that works in the space.

I have to say I am not a fan of the "Go home" response either. For different although similar reasons. I think its not a practical thing for a lot of people to do, and not a good choice even if they can. It would be better to fund them for at least a while as that money is just going to turn over in the community anyway, which at the moment is a great thing.

I do care, and I totally agree with you.

Select to expand quote

Mr Milk said..
The subsidy must be too small to ensure that local students get adequate education. Correct grammar in the previous post would be "...like you or me", not "you or I". To check, read the sentence without including "you". It sounds silly if it ends with I rather than me.

grammar.yourdictionary.com/style-and-usage/when-to-use-i-or-me-in-a-sentence.html

English is a changing and adaptable language. Much of the grammar used today would've sounded strange a century ago, and very strange indeed around three centuries ago.

Perhaps "you and I" is more common, but there is nothing silly sounding about the term "you or I". It's quite a common term these days. Don't let that get in the way of your argument though.

The Howard Government cut billions out of university funding, dramatically increased HECS and implemented a series of policies that forced universities to more than double fees and turn universities into degree factories with 1/4 full fee paying students.

The Liberal attitude towards higher education at that time was that it is a privilege, not a right or a sound economic investment in our future.

Going on current LNP policies, not much has changed. Bunch of dickheads with no idea about the importance of a good and affordable education for all.

Apparently, the right to a state funded education ends at year 12 and everything after that is a privilege.

Right, so having good doctors and lawyers and electricians is a privilege for a country - not a right? Ahh, derrrr.

Even Alan Jones, the greatest champion of conservative viewpoints in the media this country has known said

"Wouldn't it be better to send them [students] for free in the first place? What is the point?"

It would be interesting to see some pre-HECS (when university entry was somewhat "free") numbers showing the number of students that dropped out of university vs the number of students that commenced study as a percentage. The economics of it all are that unless you pay for something you will generally not place a value on it, so when you get a HECS debt you are motivated to complete your studies and then use them to gain an income. The "user pays" HECS system is still subsidised heavily by Australian society.

Select to expand quote

holy guacamole said..
The Howard Government cut billions out of university funding, dramatically increased HECS and implemented a series of policies that forced universities to more than double fees and turn universities into degree factories with 1/4 full fee paying students.

The Liberal attitude towards higher education at that time was that it is a privilege, not a right or a sound economic investment in our future.

Going on current LNP policies, not much has changed. Bunch of dickheads with no idea about the importance of a good and affordable education for all.

Apparently, the right to a state funded education ends at year 12 and everything after that is a privilege.

Right, so having good doctors and lawyers and electricians is a privilege for a country - not a right? Ahh, derrrr.

Even Alan Jones, the greatest champion of conservative viewpoints in the media this country has known said

"Wouldn't it be better to send them [students] for free in the first place? What is the point?"

Yeah, its very hypocritical to say 'we need more educated people' and then put arbitrary caps on them.

Even if increased drop-out rates happen as the entrance requirements fall, what does that matter? It becomes a market-driven supply and demand scenario. If people need tertiary qualifications for a job, they do them or settle for a job that doesn't need them.

Of the people that I went to school with the one's that were not academic would never have wanted to go to uni, but then again maybe later in life they might have when they decided they needed to. Why shouldn't they be allowed to, even if they end up failing?

Select to expand quote

Paddles B'mere said..
It would be interesting to see some pre-HECS (when university entry was somewhat "free") numbers showing the number of students that dropped out of university vs the number of students that commenced study as a percentage. The economics of it all are that unless you pay for something you will generally not place a value on it, so when you get a HECS debt you are motivated to complete your studies and then use them to gain an income. The "user pays" HECS system is still subsidised heavily by Australian society.

When I began work at a uni in the 90s there were jokes going around that HECS had taken away some of the permanent uni students. On campus you would see the same faces year after year, but then HECS meant it became too expensive to just hang around. Probably a good thing.

Then the joke became that it was still unfair as Arts students would never reach the income level where they had to pay it back

There is a simple reason why conservative governments do not like to fund higher education. Irrespective of what degree they do, across the board uni graduates tend to vote more to the left. The same certainly applies to staff. Why would you fund a group who generally don't vote for you?

Select to expand quote

musorianin said..

Mr Milk said..

musorianin said..
A short course in Australian University funding:
Dawkins reforms c. late 1990s remove full subsidy for tertiary education. Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) introduced. existence in several decades.
Full disclosure: yes, I work in this sector. Equitable access to diverse and high quality (i.e. not cheap) education is fundamental to the health of our society. Thanks for your time.

You're out by 10 years. Dawkins was Hawke's minister. Reforms were 88/89. By the late 90s, Howard was in charge.
I assume you don't teach history/politics

You'll allow me a typo perhaps, that was done on my phone; correct, I meant to write "late 1980s." Mea culpa. Aside from the proof reading and cheap shot about what I may or may not teach, do you have a point of substance about what I wrote?

You wrote all that on your phone? Must have taken hours.
Still, it would be nice to have you marking my essays. "That piece of incorrect factual information isn't wrong, it's just a typo, so it needn't be corrected" would be how it goes. Everybody gets top marks.

Select to expand quote

Subsonic said..

Mr Milk said..
The subsidy must be too small to ensure that local students get adequate education. Correct grammar in the previous post would be "...like you or me", not "you or I". To check, read the sentence without including "you". It sounds silly if it ends with I rather than me.

grammar.yourdictionary.com/style-and-usage/when-to-use-i-or-me-in-a-sentence.html

English is a changing and adaptable language. Much of the grammar used today would've sounded strange a century ago, and very strange indeed around three centuries ago.

Perhaps "you and I" is more common, but there is nothing silly sounding about the term "you or I". It's quite a common term these days. Don't let that get in the way of your argument though.

The problem is not the distinction between and and or, it's the difference between I and me. Substituting I for me is associated with pretentious women trying to talk proper and getting it wrong.