Academic Casualization in Australia: Class Divisions in the University (original) (raw)

How much is this number worth? Representations of academic casualisation in Australian universities

2018

Casualisation of the academic workforce in Australia has increasingly become a pointed issue of contestation between university managements and the union, the National Tertiary Education Union, during enterprise bargaining negotiations over the last decade. The Union has been concerned with the industrial injustice for long term insecurely employed academics, and its implications for the future academic workforce. Universities, on the other hand, had for a long time maintained that casualisation levels were not at a level detrimental to the sector and that casual employment brought benefits to both the incumbents and the university. However, by 2012, the rapid expansion of the sector, particularly in undergraduate enrolments, had meant the universities could no longer rely on expanding its casual academic workforce to meet its teaching needs. In the most recently completed rounds of enterprise bargaining around Australia, most university managements came to accept that something had...

How much is this number worth? Representations of academic casualisation in Australian universities. In D. Wache and D. Houston (Eds.), Research and Development in Higher Education: (Re)Valuing Higher Education, 41 (pp 257-266). Adelaide, Australia, 2-5 July 2018.

Research and Development in Higher Education: (Re)Valuing Higher Education, 2018

This research paper was reviewed using a double blind peer review process that meets DIISR requirements. Two reviewers were appointed on the basis of their independence and they reviewed the full paper devoid of the authors' names and institutions in order to ensure objectivity and anonymity. Papers were reviewed according to specified criteria, including relevance to the conference theme and audience, soundness of the research methods and critical analysis, originality and contribution to scholarship, and clear and coherent presentation of the argument. Following review and acceptance, this full paper was presented at the international conference.

Bullshit: an Australian perspective, or, what can an organisational change impact statement tell us about higher education in Australia?

2012

In the last few years, a scholarly critique of current forms and directions of higher education has become increasingly prominent. This work, often but not exclusively focussed on the American and British systems, and on humanities disciplines, laments the transformation of the university into ‘a fast-food outlet that sells only those ideas that its managers believe will sell [and] treats its employees as if they were too devious or stupid to be trusted’ (Parker and Jary 335). Topics include the proliferation of courses and subject areas seen as profitable, particularly for overseas students;1 the commensurate diminution or dissolution of ‘unprofitable’ areas; the de-professionalisation of academic staff and limitation of their powers in decisionmaking; the dismantling of academic disciplines and department-based academic units; the growing size and authority of management in determining priorities in research (see Laudel) and teaching; quantification and evaluation of academic work...

Know your product: an informational analysis of the higher education contribution scheme in Australia

2005

While the Constitution arrogates responsibility for educational matters to the States of Australia, the Commonwealth has been dominant in the area of university policy since the 1970s. In the creation of 'superministries' (Pusey 1991) in the early nineteen eighties the Department of Education was clustered with the portfolios of Employment and Training (DEET). In the 1990s Youth Affairs was added (DEETYA), then it became Education training and Youth Affairs (DETYA) when employment was relocated. Since 2002 it has been located with Science and Training (DEST). These classifications, while of sociological interest in illustrating the priorities of governments of the day through decisions as to bureaucratic architecture, will be subsumed in text under the 'Department of Education', or 'The Department'. 8 See Foss &Foss (2002) for a summary of the concept of distributed knowledge as taken up by theorists of information technology and organisational theory and as considered in terms of the hypothesis that distributed knowledge causes authority (as traditional hierarchical organisational structures) to fail.

Australia’s Universities

The Strategies of Australia’s Universities, 2020

Australia’s public universities are robust institutions that play a crucial role in strengthening the economic and social fabric of the country. They have a Grand Bargain with the state in which they are provided with base funding to educate students to participate in the growing knowledge economy. They also have a civic role to advance knowledge and understanding and to shape the debate on crucial issues like climate change. Because these roles require more money than is provided from government sources, the universities have adopted a commercial mindset. To guide this mindset, they each produce and publish an organisation-level strategy. We argue that these strategies are incomplete and often incoherent.

The rise and fall of Australian higher education: Paper presented to ISAA Conference, Canberra, October 2014

The rise and fall of Australian higher education There is no doubt that the Australian higher education system has grown dramatically in the last fifty years. Yet so much of this growth has not been primarily driven by the genuine educational aspirations of government leaders to grow a high quality university system. Instead, growth has primarily (though not exclusively) come from real political pressures to broaden access to a university education. Unfortunately all too often the need to address these political demands has led to educational pragmatism, centred on generating university places rather than genuinely building the capability of Australian universities. Now we are on the eve of a further dramatic transformation, again based on the logic of expanding university places. This transformation is driven by a radical model that is unashamedly based on ‘other people’s ideas’, amounting to the effective privatisation of Australian higher education. This paper will reflect on this broad history and will argue that this market-driven model will represent (another) failure of leadership in higher education.

in Australian Universities

2015

This paper reports the findings of a major national research project examining the use of multiple modes of delivery in Australian universities. A variety of factors including the increased use of online educational technology has pushed Australian universities in recent years to extend the ways in which they deliver learning and teaching. However, the extent of the uptake of these modes of delivery has remained somewhat unclear as have the precise reasons why universities have adopted multiple modes. The paper reports the result of a survey which clarifies the extent of the use of multiple modes of delivery in Australian universities and case study research that attempts to unpack the reasons for adoption. The research finds that traditional face to face delivery is still the dominant form of delivery but universities are experimenting with a surprisingly wide variety of alternatives.

The Bradley challenge: A sea change for Australian universities?

Issues in Educational Research, 2011

This paper begins with a focus on the problematic nature of one key term in the Bradley Report. Socioeconomic status, or SES as commonly used, lacks clear definition leading to ongoing debates about its measurement. A working consensus on SES and its measurement is necessary for the report’s recommendations to proceed effectively. Next we analyse research on university culture and practice relating to non-traditional students in order to develop the case for cultural transformation at the same time as broader recruitment if the new enrolment strategies are to deliver real change. We conclude with comments on the likely success of the Bradley recommendations in terms of the future of Australian universities and the broader culture.