The purpose of this Note is to provide some brief information for domestic and international students studying in Australia on some of the financial support available such as public transport concessions, child care, and other government financial assistance schemes. It also includes a brief summary of the Overseas Student Health Cover.

Go8 Note - Student Support

University funding is complex. It covers a range of different activities, sometimes in not entirely transparent ways. Policies and programs change over time. Inflation and movements in enrolments complicate the picture further. For all of these reasons, it is easy to make claims about funding over time that are only partly right. This paper looks at aggregate university funding, and funding for different university activities over time, adjusting for inflation and changes in student and staff numbers in order to develop a more informed and nuanced picture of trends.

Please click here to view or download - Go8 Backgrounder 31: Higher education financing

This backgrounder was prepared by Ms Ellen Fröhlich, head of the research department at the Freie Universität Berlin, during her visit to the Go8 in September. It adds to Go8 Backgrounder 24: ‘Answering the Global Challenge- Experiences from European Excellence Initiatives’, providing an in-depth overview of the German Excellence Initiative including the outcomes of the second round and an insight in to the general experience of the researchers and institutions involved in the process.

Please click here to to view or download - Go8 Backgrounder 24a: The German Excellence Initiative: update

Australia’s universities are doing reasonably well on the published world rankings. However, the indicators used in all the major university rankings are necessarily lagged and the earlier dominance of universities of the developed economies of North America, Britain and Europe will decline over time.  Australian universities may appear to be improving against this backdrop of decline, whereas they may well be slipping behind the emergent Asian leaders. This backgrounder explores the concept of rankings and their methodological deficiencies and looks at the public policy implications of rankings and the danger of becoming complacent.

Go8 Backgrounder 30 - World University Rankings: ambiguous signals

This is the third infrastructure survey conducted by the Go8, focusing on the state of the buildings and infrastructure at the Go8 universities. This most recent survey collated data relating to aspects of the estate not previously explored, including leasing arrangements, space utilisation, parking, and transportation modes.

Please click here to view or download - Go8 Infrastructure Survey Report 2011

Also see - 

Go8 Infrastructure Survey Report 2009

Go8 Infrastructure Survey Report 2007

The purpose of this Note is to provide a summary of the student visa process including the recent changes following the Knight review.  

Please click here to view or download -   Go8 Note – Student Visas

Singapore, like Australia, is one of the world’s most prosperous countries. However, the basis for Singapore’s prosperity is quite different from that of Australia’s and for this reason it provides an interesting and complementary case study.

Please click here to view or download -

Go8 Backgrounder 28 - The university-innovation nexus in Singapore

This paper examines Commonwealth funding for universities over the period 1996-2010.  Governments have boosted and cut university funding in different ways over time.  Governments of both parties have taken measures to improve funding, but increases in recurrent funding tend not to be sustained in real terms as the sector expands.  The data point to the fiscal limits to any Government’s capacity to fund a mass (and post-mass) higher education system under the current funding framework.

Please click here to view or download - 

Go8 Backgrounder 27 - University Funding 1996-2010

Demand for university study has shifted markedly towards fields which require a solid grounding in quantitative skills (Science, Engineering, Health). However patterns of Year 12 participation by field are not consistent with tertiary demand. Many new students entering university may be under-prepared for study in quantitative fields. The most basic level of maths is now the most commonly completed maths course at Year 12 while the study of intermediate maths has declined. There has been very little improvement in female participation in advanced maths, physics and chemistry.

 Please click here to view or download -  Go8 Policy Note 6 - National trends in Year 12 course completions

The Bradley Review’s recommendation of a demand-driven system of funding university places was made without explicit reference to labour market demand for particular skills and qualifications. It has been implemented without much regard for student demand by field of education. It is clear that the Government underestimated both students’ and universities’ reaction to the opening up of the system. For this reason, initial projections of the cost of a demand-driven system were understated.

Student demand has shifted to more expensive fields (Science, Engineering and especially Health), increasing the fiscal cost of the demand-driven system.  The gap between funding and costs is biggest in these more expensive fields, and demand-driven funding will reduce universities’ ability to cross-subsidise more expensive programs.  Underfunding, and caps on prices, mean universities will have limited incentives to offer enough places in the fields students want.  There is fundamental contradiction: volume has been deregulated, while price remains fixed.

Please click here to download or view - Go8 Policy Note 5 - Demand for Higher Education by Field

Business and universities are different but complementary parts of the national innovation system and the effectiveness of the system depends on them working together. Linkages require reciprocity and both sectors need to play a role in initiating and strengthening them; neither sector can act in isolation from the other and all parties need to respond to the needs and concerns of the others.

Please click the link to view or download - Go8 Backgrounder 26 - The university-business nexus in Australia

This paper shows that while the absolute amount of higher education research funding has grown significantly, the relative shares of research income and research block grant funding of the major university groupings in Australia has been largely unchanged over the past two decades, with most redistribution of shares occurring between non-Go8 institutions.

Please click here to view or download -  Go8 Policy Note 4 - Research Performance

A major policy shift in the 1990s saw the Finnish state become an active player in innovation, which changed the research-innovation nexus substantially. This shift was characterised by the introduction of differentiated tertiary education qualifications (polytechnics and universities), the consequences of which were remarkable achievements in Finland’s higher education and innovation sectors.

Being a small but advanced industrial economy with limited resources and markets, Finland is dependent on external trade and the internationalisation of research and innovation. The backgrounder looks in detail at Finnish university and innovation systems and the nexus between them, drawing on Nokia as a case study. It concludes that strong national vision and an acceptance of the need for national investment building on human capital rather than natural resources has been an important factor in promoting and facilitating flows of information, technology and funding between the education sector and business.

In response to the Bradley Review, the Government has uncapped the number of university places – an important move towards a ‘universal’ higher education system. A large proportion of the additional students will be less academically prepared than was expected in the past.

This policy note highlights the recent strong growth in offers to applicants with Australian Tertiary Admission Ranks (ATARs) of 50-70 and 50 or below.

Please click here to view or download - Go8 Policy Note 3 - University Admissions