There is a widely held view among higher education leaders and commentators that the current UK university funding system might lead to a crisis. More than 50 per cent of UK universities are operating in the negative with no prospect of funding levels improving. The hope that increased international student fee income will save the day is diminishing. Current policy changes are coinciding with these declining international student numbers. This scenario is replicated with less intensity in other countries, and the fate of global universities is painted as bleak.

The Japanese word for "crisis", Kiki, when written in Kanji (危機) is a combination of the characters for "dangerous" (危) and "opportunity" (機). It is possible to experience both at the same time and Japanese leaders are admired for recognising the need to respond to danger whilst striving to boldly embrace opportunity.

Sensitivity, ethics and wisdom serve leaders well in both aspects of 'Kiki leadership' when responding to challenges. Last year's emergence of generative AI caused some leaders, institutions, and regulators to see crisis and only respond with a defensive mindset.

It was eye-opening to learn that Arizona State University recently responded by announcing a strategic partnership with OpenAI, the first university to do so. This partnership liberates its staff and students to embrace, experiment and innovate with the technology, grasping opportunity. Loughborough University also made news for using AI avatars to replicate lectures from global experts and subject leaders from the design world. In both instances, a rational approach to exploring opportunity among crisis requires caution and determination in equal measure, with consideration of ethics and viability to be balanced with boldness and experimentation.

Higher education leaders are typically experts in their field of discipline, which they then apply to their wider institution. They lead diverse universities with diverse histories, seeking the opportunity to create distinct missions. Loughborough has a history of being research and sports focused, but its new strategy looks at creating a better future through partnerships with technology providers and ed-tech companies.

There are many opportunities for UK and other global universities to follow in Arizona State's footsteps. There is a strong ed-tech sector well placed to support opportunistic approaches. Forging strong partnerships with ed-tech companies can be one route to differentiation that is not well measured by rankings, but still an opportunity in current circumstances.

All universities would do well, as Loughborough has, to see itself as more than its rank. There is demonstrable evidence that rankings can hinder a university's mission and inhibit bold leadership.

Loughborough University started in a position of distinct subject specialisation, and its partnership approaches are now led by an AI computer scientist with a strong research pedigree. Will a vice-chancellor's role eventually be replaced by AI? It appears unlikely in our lifetimes, because of the role's requirement of social interaction, ethical judgement and the ability to decipher big, complex university issues.

We may need more leaders that can practice the art of Kiki. It would be easy at the start of 2024 for leaders to be overcome by a sense of crisis and to be blinded from seeing opportunity. Is the quintessential start-of-year 'all-staff email' a message that will cause a fragile culture to spiral downwards? A response that stirs an ethical and rational approach to seeking opportunity is most needed at this time.

This is a time when we least need our vice-chancellors and presidents to be formulaic and replaceable by AI. We need to see boldness and distinction that will differentiate one university from another. I reflect on these matters in this HEDx episode with Andrea Burrows and Professor Nick Jennings.

Andrea Burrows is the UK managing director for Online Education Services (OES), an education body that partners with universities across Britain and Europe to create 'student-centric' online learning. She has a professional leadership background in marketing, advertising and digital transformation across higher education, finance and professional service sectors.

Professor Nick Jennings is vice-chancellor of Loughborough University with a research background in AI and cybersecurity. He researched AI systems that use both human and software aspects to be robust and useful in large scale environments. Loughborough is a UK university renowned for its sports and research capabilities.

The union said overseas students are being disproportionately affected by rising food and rent prices and adhering to tight housing and transport rules is making it worse.

International students can only work a maximum of 48 hours a fortnight, unless they work in the aged care sector, and cannot apply for many education-related travel subsidies.

The Union recommends the establishment of migrant worker centres in each state for workplace rights advice, the reconsideration of work hour restrictions on student visas, and an extension of travel subsidies.

Covid-era laws allowed migrant students to work unlimited hours and study remotely, but were canned in July this year.

Unions NSW assistant secretary Thomas Costa said these restrictions can lead to many international students accepting 'substandard' living conditions and being underpaid by employers.

"Our data paints a grim reality of exploitation and hardship among temporary migrant workers, with international students facing the brunt of the housing crisis," Mr Costa said.

"It is high time that educational institutions step up to provide adequate housing, and that the NSW government extends travel concessions to international students, ensuring parity with other students."

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reported that rent has risen 14 per cent in the year to July 2023 for new tenants, which the Union pointed out overwhelmingly includes overseas students studying in Australia.

"Temporary migrants contributed $29 billion to the Australian economy in 2022," Mr Costa said.

"Yet, they are met with reinstated caps on work hours and a lack of support services. Universities and the government must act to avert a deepening of this crisis."

International student levy

International students could soon also be subject to a tax for coming to learn in Australia, that has potential to bring $1b each year to the tertiary education sector.

The federal government is considering taxing international students to help cut soaring migration numbers, which are also contributing to the nation’s rental crisis.

However, the University of Adelaide (Adelaide) said they fear the potential impost could damage Australia's reputation as a student destination and have a negative economic impact.

An Adelaide spokeswoman said international students brought “enormous benefits” to SA, both "culturally and economically".

"A levy of any kind … will risk the enduring success of the sector, risk our global reputation, and is not in the national interest," she said.

The Australian Universities Accord interim report raised the idea of a levy on international students, which the Group of Eight universities rejected.

SA Premier Peter Malinauskas said he has not yet received briefings from the federal government about the levy.

"As a state, we’ve made changes to try and grow the number of international students we can accommodate without that being at the expense of domestic education," the Premier said.

"So we would want to make sure any changes that occur federally don’t undermine that."

A Queensland University of Technology (QUT) survey of 1191 participants found all cohorts – 790 social work students, 196 educators and 294 practitioners – overwhelmingly think internships should be paid or come with financial support.

Professor Christine Morley from QUT School of Public Health and Social Work presented her findings to the Senate, stating that 1,000 hours of unpaid work placement that students are required to complete causes some to drop out, live in poverty, and/or struggle with mental health.

"Placements impede students’ capacity to do paid work, which means many cannot afford food, rent, healthcare and transport," Professor Morley said.

"Given that social work students are often drawn from disadvantaged backgrounds, they are more vulnerable to experiencing poverty, which is even more serious with the marked cost of living increases.

"Some are mature-aged students with families to support who are also unable to afford to continue their study."

Ninety per cent of surveyed students said they wanted the quality of their learning to be of higher value than the number of hours worked, instead of the current inverse.

Social work students complete their internships in two 500-hour blocks, but cannot undertake their placement where they already work, even if it is an appropriate social work setting.

Increased flexibility was a popular solution to the stress that comes with juggling their existing job commitments and placement hours, and could include offering remote or virtual learning opportunities.

“Funding for unpaid work while students are learning, equivalent to the minimum wage, is needed urgently to provide financial assistance to domestic and international students undertaking field placements,” Professor Morley said.

“These factors put potential students off studying, cause students to drop out, and stop people from completing their degrees.

“This means that people from disadvantaged background are prevented from getting a professional degree, which especially limits diverse cohorts from studying vital progressions such as social work, nursing and teaching, and, indeed, the sustainability of these professions.

“Student attrition is directly linked to workforce shortages, particularly in Australia’s regional and rural areas and a shortage of high-quality placements for future students.”

One student reported they weren’t able to be recognised for prior learning relevant to the coursework and had to do their placement all over again.

“I am withdrawing from social work as I ... have 20-years-experience working in mental health running groups and can’t get any recognition for workplace experience” they said.

“I’ve worked under supervision from a social worker and they are as frustrated as I am. This is absolute madness.”

The University of South Australia recently trialled a virtual learning tool for students studying social work, but it does not act as a replacement for the 1,000 hours.

Members of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) at the University of Melbourne (UniMelb) voted to launch major industrial action for up to a period of seven days.

The industrial action will take place during UniMelb's graduate conferral and semester two census dates.

UniMelb Arts Faculty members' seven-day strike began at 12:00am this morning and will conclude at 11:59pm September 3.

Member at 757 Swanston Street, VCA School of Art, and FFAM Stagecraft Team will also strike for seven days beginning midday today and ending at 11:59pm September 3.

Melbourne Law School and Scholarly Services members will strike for five days beginning midday today and ending at 11:59pm on September 1.

All members employed by the university, excluding members from Arts, Law, Scholarly Services or at 757 Swanston Street, will commence a half-day strike starting midday today and ending at 7:30pm.

"Staff don't take any strike action lightly, especially not for an entire working week. We have been left with no choice," NTEU UniMelb Branch President David Gonzalez said.

NTEU’s National Defence Fund will partially supplement lost income for members who choose to strike; members must participate in visible action to qualify.

"Even after repaying $45 million in lost wages, university management is trying to deny staff the fair pay increase they deserve,” NTEU National President Dr Alison Barnes said.

UniMelb has already repaid a total of $45m in staff underpayments and is involved in an ongoing case in the Federal court for allegedly underpaying 14 casual staff.

The Fair Work Ombudsman has alleged that UniMelb took punitive action against casual academics to prevent them from claiming payment for their work.

Instead of paying 14 casual academics in the Faculty of Arts, as required under its enterprise agreements, the university paid the staff on benchmarks, which varied across employees.

There was no consistent approach to the benchmarking, with some employees being required to complete 4,000 words per hour of marking, while others were allocated one hour per student, according to the Ombudsman.

The NTEU has claimed the university kept false or misleading records of hours worked by casual academics.

"The University of Melbourne has engaged in industrial-scale wage theft, giving it the shameful title of Australia's worst underpayment university," Dr Barnes said.

"Even after repaying $45 million in lost wages, university management is trying to deny staff the fair pay increase they deserve.

"Universities need to abandon approaches like Melbourne's to enterprise bargaining. It's seriously out of touch with the universities accord, which is rightly pushing institutions to become exemplary employers."

NTEU VIC Division Secretary Sarah Roberts said, "Industrial action at Melbourne and most of the other Victorian universities during open days show you progress on bargaining is way behind where it should be.

Throwing away the baby with the bathwater

The temptation for governments, education authorities and even major universities to put blanket bans on entire market segments of online providers or to question the authenticity or surety of all online offerings is an overreaction. To simply do so follows that old crooked logic thinking of: A dog has four legs, fur and a tail. So, everything with four legs, fur and a tail is a dog? Clearly, that logic is questionable. 

We maintain that online provision and fully accredited private providers aren’t the problem – it is how we choose to assess and engage with students that makes the difference. And the recent QILT 2022 responses unambiguously indicate that a number of Australian private providers (those not embedded in research, but highly teaching focussed) have, again, topped the charts nationally in respect to engaging with and supporting students during their studies.

The QILT results help show that some of our smaller, private providers pride themselves on knowing their students and their capacities and in helping them avoid the temptation to resort to assignment fraud.

Separating teaching and assessment

Certainly, back in the days of yore (which wasn’t all that long ago in our opinion) essays during a term were frequently (certainly in many European universities) just indicators of a student’s progress (formative) rather than pivotal elements of their summative assessment. In the UK, end of year and end of term exams and tests customarily determined whether a student continued or departed. And even then, student essays and exam papers were submitted anonymously and often marked collegially at a peer institution – thus overcoming the risk of bias or nepotism. But most interestingly, the teaching term (or semester) was not bulked-up with continuous pauses for internal assessment processes or reviewing of assignment group work in the way that many academic courses are now delivered. Teaching and assessment were, essentially, more separated and teaching was the more dominant activity with assessment occurring only at the end of an intensive teaching period.

We believe, this is a resolvable scenario. Again, much of the answer lies in how we choose to assess students’ work and the Sector’s willingness to move away from some of its current assessment practices. 

A Return to the Examination Hall or viva voce

Returning to face-to-face examinations is a possible answer to elements of the student fraud scenario. Though the examination hall could either be a physical space or an electronically mediated and timed virtual space. Essays written in timed online examinations are also frequently utilised by some institutions. 

By far the greatest potential to determine that students are individually progressing, up-to-speed and academically equipped is to return to the viva voce. Again, this may be laborious and time consuming, but it is recognised as highly effective – and can be conducted live via Zoom or other electronic interfaces. A student questioned in real time has to either know their subject or be left wanting. Emphatically, it is the student who gets to demonstrate their learning – and not an external actor on a contract cheating website. Some universities do this already in a variety of disciplines. Doing it routinely and across the board would be a means of authoritatively gauging true student achievement.

Non contract arrangements

Less on the radar, perhaps, is the potential for non-contract and familial augmentation of assignments and online assessments by others. Or in the old currency: parental involvement. In just the last month we have (coincidentally) also come across a small number of parents who state that they take their children’s tertiary education so seriously that they have been checking, editing, re-writing and ‘adding value to’ every online assignment and test their sons and daughters have been given- including the academic dissertation of one young man studying at master’ level.

Dealing with cheating

TEQSA’s task of closing access to contract cheating websites and imposing large fines on offenders is one strategy. Talk of changing student culture within universities in respect to cheating is another. The latter is an unlikely project as cultural perceptions as to what cheating is and how it is construed vary greatly around the globe. In some cultures, ‘getting caught’ is shameful but ‘getting away with it’ isn’t. Academic cheating will escalate as they are clearly lucrative opportunities for those involved.

To do nothing significant or to leave it to each university/provider to decide how to act will surely weaken Australia’s entire higher education reputation significantly.

Emeritus Professor Jim Mienczakowski is currently a Higher Education Consultant.

Emeritus Professor Greg Whateley is currently Deputy Vice Chancellor at Group Colleges Australia.

More contemporary approaches to digital innovation are organised in different ways. Sometimes these are whole organisation strategies seeking new products or markets. In others they are new start-ups where the focus is creating new business models. The skunkworks model is like the online arms of many universities. But which of these scenarios is how we might best innovate in both research and learning, in universities in the future?

In all the scenarios described above, the creation of an innovation culture is critical. And preferably aligned with a strongly shared sense of purpose. A sense of the purpose of universities, as existing to serve the public good, is common among leaders and practitioners. It is one part of what makes them great places to work. Another is the flexibility they provide to many that work in them to pursue their own ideas and interests and do things in their own ways. Many academics would like to think of themselves as their own skunkworks or start up. Indeed Clark Kerr, president of the University of California in the 1960s famously said “the university is a series of individual entrepreneurs held together
by a common grievance about parking.”  

But how can creating individual entrepreneurial culture and opportunity be reconciled at a strategic level to create broad innovative activity to meet the wider organisational needs at our own times of battling global phenomena? In an era of the great resignation and quiet quitting it is even harder to get large groups of people in all organisations, including universities, aligned behind change and strategy when some are currently scarred by and weighed down with coping with business as usual.

The purpose of a university includes to research and teach. The identification of what, how and with whom to do research is typically left to individuals in their tribes and disciplines in the academic heartlands which we variously organise and give focus to in centres and institutes. There are coordinated ways of governing ethics, practice, and infrastructure. Some of the joined up and coordinated work happens in translation and commercialisation. Building a culture of innovation in commercialisation requires staff empowerment, and a licence to explore and experiment with a high tolerance for mistakes or unsuccessful outcomes in psychologically safe environments.

Some of the most advanced examples of this in Australia are open to engagement of all disciplines. They are typically activity not only for staff, but a focal point for engagement of alumni and industry partners. They often embrace multiple centres and institutes. They thrive on cultures that encourage experimentation and pursuing uncertain outcomes.

In teaching and learning there is an interesting difference. Academics and disciplines strive for freedom and space to apply their own ideas and pedagogies and share their own interpretations of scholarly knowledge. But they do so within the constraints of an increasingly regulated, organised, and controlled environment. Making mistakes or failing with experiments in an environment of continuous and heightened student needs and expectations, as well as ubiquitous student evaluations, is a situation where few staff feel empowered and encouraged to take uncertain chances on their own.

The University of Melbourne was bold in breaking with sector-wide conventions in applying a common new framework across all disciplines with the Melbourne model that became the Melbourne curriculum. This venture largely overcame initial fears of some academics and disciplines during its implementation and has proven to be attractive to students and successful in outcomes. It was an initiative and innovation of its time as a response to an opportunity to be distinct as Australia’s leading university. The venture by Victoria University to innovate with a block teaching model has also been a differentiating
university-wide entrepreneurial pedagogic venture with successful outcomes.

One of the biggest impacts of the pandemic over the last 3 years has been the need for all in our universities to adhere to tighter centralised constraints on modes of delivery, campus access and delivery of student experience. There have also been greatly changed demands, expectations and preferences for students which also widely impacts what we do and how.

But pedagogic practice and the mode of engaging academics and partners also differs between disciplines. For some such as medicine, education, engineering and a business school it is practiced in close partnership with external communities. There is a strong argument to say that not one size fits all in how to innovate in learning practices. And yet while it is crucial for the wider university to strategically plan for a future size and shape, as Melbourne currently is, one could argue that it is also crucial to plan for its future nature.

Planning for teaching and learning innovation across a university can be through a federal model of allowing each component organisational unit and discipline group to experiment individually. But drawing on institutional expertise in higher education policy and practice, can also allow it to be adopted and extended in the wider organisation wisely by an organisation and leadership sensitive to academic culture and innovative practice and with a strong sense of strategy and a goal of a culture of innovation.

We will probably see growth in commercialisation and translation of research by universities as a ‘nice to have’. We will need a culture and support to allow it to flourish. And as we look to plan the future size and shape of our universities more closely, we will need to innovate in the nature of what they do in teaching as a ‘must have’. This may continue to see groups and disciplines actively exploring new products, markets, and business models in their organisational areas and in partnership with their external communities.

The trick will be to find ways of adopting and sharing success and learnings more broadly across the wider range of fields, diverse staff and the size and shape of a future university for it to excel and thrive as a whole. This was the focus of a conversation on university strategy and leadership with Duncan Maskell the VC of Melbourne University on HEDx last week which you can access here.

Emeritus Professor Martin Betts, Co-founder of HEDx

Professor Joe Graffam, Deakin’s chair in psychology as well as its pro-vice chancellor of teaching and learning, will open the conference, which is now in its 13th year. Explaining the rationale behind the conference’s former felon speakers, Graffam rhetorically asked, “Who knows more and is listened to less?”.

Bolstering this is the fact that, post-jail, they’ve become exemplary social justice leaders, dedicated to helping vulnerable communities. Glenn E Martin, who will be speaking via Sykpe due to visa issues relating to his incarceration, served six years at in a New York State prison in the early 1990s. He then founded JustLeadershipUSA, an organisation dedicated to cutting the US correctional population in half by 2030. Keenan Mundine grew up in Sydney’s Redfern, and began a life of lawlessness in his teens. Following his participation in a therapeutic program whilst in custody, he transformed. Now, he mentors Indigenous young adults who are at risk of criminality, pre- and post-incarceration. Former drug addict and inmate Bianca Amoranto now works at Women’s Justice Network as their youth support worker.

Glenn E Martin

Keenan Mundine

Bianca Amoranto

The speakers, who Graffam said have had no effect on conference registrations, will propose policies to improve reintegration. These strategies aim to enhance communities for ex-convicts and others, and reduce prison populations by curbing recidivism. “Prisons do not do anything but contain people,” Graffam flatly stated. A variety of factors, including housing instability, drug and alcohol use, insufficient social support and unemployment lead to re-offending. Two-thirds of people who are unemployed, post-prison release, end up back in jail.

Because of this, Graffam wants some of the $1 billion in annual prison funds be diverted to disadvantaged, crime-prone communities. This could be simple, considering in Victoria, for example, more than half of convicts come from 6 per cent of the state's postcodes. While some in those communities can withstand negative social influences, "a fair proportion get swept up and are carried along in the stream of disadvantage, to a destination that is no good for anyone, including society", Graffam explained.

Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show prison populations have ballooned over the past decade. In the first quarter of this year, there were around 40,570 people behind bars, Australia-wide. In 2007, that figure was just 25,968.

Now, the Australian government is investing in preventing it on our shores. It has bequeathed $1.9 million to Melbourne University and Edith Cowan University (ECU) to beef up their cyber security courses.

In accepting the gift, ECU vice-chancellor professor Steve Chapman boasted that his institution already has "one of the best" cyber security programs, with 1000 graduates to date.

It is meaningful, and not only because cyberattacks have proliferated worldwide: there also aren’t enough experts to combat it. There will be a global shortfall of over 1.5 million cybersecurity professionals by 2020. In Australia, a fifth of these positions will remain vacant if the deficit isn’t addressed.

Cybersecurity has a range of applications beyond government and cybersecurity firms. The largest companies in the world – Google, Facebook and Microsoft, for instance – hire cybersecurity specialists. Those in the field reap the financial rewards of this. “Cybersecurity skills are in such high demand we see our best students being offered six figure salaries when they’re only in their second year of a degree,” ECU school of science executive dean professor Andrew Woodward said.

But the new funding isn’t solely dedicated to enhancing current students’ experiences. It will also be funneled to programs enticing school kids to study STEM subjects, short courses for those already in the field, and university pathway programs for TAFE students.

Those who graduate from ECU with a cyber security qualification might expert to work for WA Police, Australian Federal Police, Cisco, Interpol, Woodside, Emirates Airlines or CERT Australia; all partners of the university.

With that, Bentley-based Mahaguna became a future Stanford student, and concomitantly gained much status: Stanford was ranked second globally in the most recent QS World University Rankings. Along with seven of his Bachelor of Commerce peers at Curtin, he was selected from a shortlist of 200 students to complete an eight-week International Honours Program at the prestigious California university.

His success is the result of the execution of a three-year agreement between Curtin and Stanford, which enables preselected Curtin students to complete the Stanford International Honours Program. Lasting eight weeks, the program comprises eight units of study. It also encompasses cultural and cocurricular activities. Curtin will subsidise its students' costs, as well as pay their travel expenses.

Mahaguna will depart on 24 June 2017 for the adventure, which he is “expecting to be challenging".

Supawit Mahaguna is off to northern California to study at Stanford. Photo: Annabelle Fouchard, Curtin University 

Curtin is the 22nd institution worldwide to sign such an agreement with Stanford. Students from 16 of these institutions will join Mahaguna there. He is looking forward to networking with them, and hopefully, down the road, exploring the opportunities this presents. "I think it will raise my profile in terms of my resume, and that sort of thing," he modestly commented.

The find is remarkable: it shows that over half of Australia’s megapodes no longer exist.

But what did they look like in the Pleistocene – the era in which they roamed – alongside other megafauna? Two had long, thin legs and beaks, while another two resembled "nuggetty chickens", according to the research team, with stumpy legs, solid bodies, and wedge-like beaks. The latter have been classified under a new genus: Latagallina. One had a large, ornamental tail, that stood on end like a brush-turkey’s. Due to their elongated, strong wing bones, it is likely they all flew, and roosted in trees. Their small feet differed from those of their modern cousins, who have large claws.

Their largeness may be attributable to their environment. As it became drier, forests evolved into woodland and grassland. As such, animals could grow as there was more space for them to do so, explained one of the researchers, Flinders university PhD candidate Elen Shute.

There is little evidence surrounding their disappearance. However, in the case of one species, it could have been caused by humans: fossilised eggshells have been found with scorch marks, which suggests the eggs had been cooked over fire.

This is the first major megapode discovery since the 1970s, which built upon breakthroughs from the 1880s. Fossils from Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia were examined before the researchers released their findings. Fossils pertaining to two of the extinct species were found in the Thylacoleo Caves, discovered 15 years ago beneath the Nullarbor Plain.

“So far, the Thylacoleo Caves have yielded seven new species of kangaroo, a frog, two giant ground-cuckoos, and now two new megapodes,” said Flinders palaeontology professor Gavin Prideaux.

To Shute, the recent bird fossil discoveries were more surprising than those of the other animals. “We knew that mammals suffered heavy losses during the late Pleistocene but, up until recently, we only knew of 10 species of birds that had been extirpated during this time period," she said.

“It’s giving us a window that maybe all hasn’t been plain sailing for Australian birds over the last few tens of thousands of years.”