Education isn’t a commodity for labor

There is no apprenticeships ‘crisis’ in Australia

It’s rare to find an issue that unites both sides of politics, employers and trade unions, yet these unlikely allies have all claimed there is an apprenticeships “crisis”.

In 2016, Labor leader Bill Shorten said that the number of Australians training for apprenticeships was at its lowest level since 2001, blaming Coalition funding cuts for plummeting numbers.

This year, the assistant minister for vocational education and skills, Karen Andrews, explained the Coalition government’s new Skilling Australians Fund would restore “alarming” apprenticeship numbers to 2012 levels. She said:

Labor’s withdrawal of employer incentives contributed to a massive decline.

The Australian Council of Trade Unions claims apprenticeship numbers have experienced a “catastrophic drop” under the Abbott/Turnbull government.

The Business Council of Australia, Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the Australian Industry Group also claim that apprenticeships have declined by 45% since 2012.

A new report from the Mitchell Institute exposes some of the misconceptions behind these claims, finding some truth and a more purposeful way forward in the apprenticeships debate.

What’s causing the confusion?

The term “apprenticeship” can be misleading, as it is often used to refer to both traditional apprenticeships and traineeships. Both apprenticeships and traineeships involve a combination of employment and a formal contract of training, but have quite different backgrounds and applications.

Apprenticeships are largely in the trades – areas like electrical, plumbing, construction and commercial cooking – and typically involve a four-year contract. Most people still associate apprenticeships with trades.

Traineeships, while also combining employment and formal training, were created by the Commonwealth government in the 1980s to provide job opportunities for young people, particularly in the services sector.

Both apprenticeships and traineeships have an important role to play. However, information (and numbers) relating to both systems are often presented together as “apprenticeships”, creating a misleading picture about the state of the traditional trade-based apprenticeship system.

What’s the real story?

When separating out apprenticeships and traineeships, it becomes clear that apprenticeships are not in crisis. In fact, some trade apprenticeships have experienced growth in recent years.

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The chart above shows trade commencements (mostly traditional trade apprenticeships) have been relatively stable over the past 20 years or so, and are certainly not falling off a cliff.

Non-trade commencements (mostly representing traineeships), on the other hand, have experienced a sharp decline since 2012.

However, our report shows the high numbers of traineeships in 2011 to 2012 were caused by a number of policy changes. These include the availability of employer incentives, and the expansion of the trainee system to cover existing, not just new workers, and part-time as well as full-time staff.

Together, these policies made it very appealing for companies to take on a trainee, or to make an existing employee a trainee, as in some cases the incentive acted as an effective wage subsidy.

Evidence emerged that these incentives were being misused, and the Commonwealth Government rightly scaled back eligibility from 2012 to 2013. This explains the steady rise and then significant drop in trainee commencements over this period.

However, these changes did not affect funding for trade apprenticeships at all.

What’s the story with apprenticeships?

The situation with traditional trade apprenticeships is more complex. A number of factors influence apprenticeship commencements across different occupations.

The first point to make is that not all trade apprenticeships have declined since 2013. As the chart below shows, some have grown – and the extent of decline varies between occupations.

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If funding changes do not account for the decline in commencements, what other factors might explain it?

The answer is a range of economic and social factors, including negative and low growth in full-time employment throughout 2013 to 2016, ongoing structural change in the composition of the labour market and the relevance of the current apprenticeship model in some occupations, as well as supply factors, including potentially a decline in the quality of the apprenticeship applicant pool.

Where to from here?

Both sides of politics, employers and unions should – and clearly do – care about apprenticeships.

However, the apprenticeship system would be better served if less time was spent on political point-scoring and more on acknowledging this complex picture.

Both apprenticeships and traineeships have a vital role to play in building the skills base of the future Australian workforce. But they also need to remain relevant and responsive to changing needs, and sit within an integrated and considered tertiary education and training system, encompassing a range of VET and higher education options.

There’s a long way to go to achieve that goal, but finding some truth in the apprenticeships debate is a good start.

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The UK is rethinking university degrees and Australia should too

There are growing calls for a debate about the role of post-school in society, both in Australia and overseas.

After 30 years of constant expansion, some complain that universities have become too vocational in nature – too focused on jobs, not enough on the art of inquiry.

At the same time, the vocational education sector is reeling from 15 years of funding cuts and the aftershocks of failed free-market experiments. Numbers in trade apprenticeships and traineeships are plummeting. Less than 30% of vocational students in Australia work in the areas in which they studied.

The same is true of higher education. An annual survey of university graduates from 2014 shows that 54% of all bachelor’s degree holders said their qualification was a formal requirement for their job. But the proportion ranged from one in four humanities graduates to 96% of medical graduates. The more regulated the profession, the more degree and career path are likely to be correlated.

The British higher education system is rolling out an alternative education route. Degree apprenticeships were launched in the UK in 2015. These are designed to bridge the gap between technical skills, employment and higher education.

They’re part of a larger scheme intended to reinvigorate apprenticeships more broadly. A 0.5% levy on corporations with an income of more than £3 million (A$4.8 million) funds the system.

Supporters say the initiative is good for employers and good for students, especially for disadvantaged students. They not only struggle to get into higher education (despite an uncapped system) but are also much more likely to drop out of it.

Degree apprenticeships work a lot like traditional trade apprenticeships: students work in a related job with their education strapped on around their employment.

Traditional degrees are steeped in theory and deliver practical experience through internships, practicums or other work-based experiences. In contrast, degree apprenticeships deliver a skill and a qualification simultaneously. Students work four days a week and study for one.

Crucially, the apprenticeship levy covers tuition fees, so students don’t graduate with a debt. If adopted here, this could enable Australia to avoid the distress over rising debts seen in the UK, where it is expected 80% of students will never fully repay their loans.

In the last UK election, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn rode a rising tide of anger among younger voters over student debt with his promise of a return to free higher education.

Even Andrew Adonis, Tony Blair’s former adviser and architect of the current loans scheme, has switched camps. He described the income-contingent loans scheme that resulted in a tripling of fees in 2012 as a Frankenstein’s monster and “a Ponzi scheme”.

While Australia doesn’t have the same immediate crisis, several factors suggest higher education could be heading slowly towards a tipping point. Government plans to increase university fees and introduce more rigorous parameters for the Higher Education Loans Program (formerly HECS) have sparked furious debate.

Meanwhile, graduates face a declining employment market. Just 69% of graduates in 2014 held a full-time job four months after graduation, compared to 81% a decade earlier.

Part-time work, casualisation and under-employment are widespread. Graduate salaries have been more or less static for years. Increasingly, students, particularly the most advantaged, turn to postgraduate education to boost their chances in an overcrowded jobs market, raising questions over credentialism.

Having larger numbers of people with a higher degree produces public benefits, including better health, better parenting, higher rates of volunteering and lower rates of incarceration. But all of this comes at a cost to the taxpayer and does little to correct an imbalance in skills entering the jobs market. Too many lawyers does not balance out a shortage in IT experts or agricultural scientists.

The question is whether new pathways need to be created to help young people straddle the gap between education and work.

Work is under way on this issue in Australia. The University of Tasmania, for example, is adding associate degrees, which are shorter, cheaper and more vocationally focused on local industries than full bachelor degrees.

Perhaps other institutions, particularly those in regional and outer-metropolitan areas, should consider the possibilities offered by the UK-style degree apprenticeship model. These are the universities, after all, that educate by far the greatest proportion of disadvantaged students.

Ironically, degree apprenticeships are a modern, more work-intensive version of the associate degrees that colleges of advanced education offered before the higher education system was unified under the Hawke government in 1989.

Perhaps part of the emerging discussion should include a return to a tripartite public education and training system, which includes TAFE, teaching-only polytechnics and research-intensive universities.

The post-secondary education sector may have a limited appetite for more structural reform. However, as a society, we do need to tackle the question of whether a higher education system devised 30 years ago, onto which uncapped student places have been glued, is still fit for purpose. Times have changed and education systems must surely move with them.

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This article was prepared with the help of Julie Hare, Associate Director, KPMG Australia.

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The Biggest Misconception About Today’s College Students

Title: The Biggest Misconception About Today’s College Students

Author: Gail O. Mellow

Source: The New York Times

In a recent op-ed in The New York Times, president of LaGuardia Community College and ACE Board Member Gail O. Mellow offered her perspective on today’s college students. Namely, they aren’t who you think they are, and the higher education community could help remove barriers to their success by realizing that.

Mellow points to realities that may be surprising to some. More than 40 percent of the country’s undergraduates attend a community college. Over half of all undergraduates are living at home to make their degrees more affordable. More than 40 percent work more than 40 hours a week, and one-quarter work full-time and go to school full-time.

Today’s college students face an array of hardships and pressures that were less common in the past. To better accommodate them, Mellow suggests increasing funding to community colleges, making federal and state financial aid more flexible, and enhancing paid internships and work study programs.

How South Sudan’s universities have survived civil war and independence

After almost half a century of conflict, South Sudan attained its independence from Sudan in July 2011. One of the challenges it faces as a new country is a small and troubled higher education system.

Sudan’s three oldest public universities – Juba, Bahr el Ghazal and Upper Nile – all have their origins in southern Sudan. In the late 1980s they were relocated to Khartoum in the north. This was ostensibly done to protect students and faculty from the war. It also allowed the regime to execute the war away from the scrutiny of intellectuals. In exile the universities flourished, acquiring additional property and staff.

After the comprehensive peace agreement between the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) and the government of Sudan in January 2005, the return of the universities became one of the priorities of the Government of the Southern Sudan. In late 2010 the institutions were moved back south.

But the return was rancorous. The universities left behind some of their most valuable assets – experienced academics, buildings, libraries and laboratory equipment. Infrastructure was taken over by the University of Bahri in Khartoum North.

In the south, universities struggled to reestablish themselves. They needed to resettle students, recruit staff and acquire new facilities and equipment. Issues of physical infrastructure and severe staff shortages trouble the university system.

Recently renewed conflict between factions of the ruling SPLM has exacerbated the problems. The hostilities in the Upper Nile region have drastically reduced oil production, which accounts for 98% of South Sudan’s GDP. This plus the plunge in global oil prices placed serious constraints on state funding of higher education.

Still, South Sudan has five functioning public universities: the three cited above, as well as Dr John Garang Memorial University of Science and Technology and Rumbek University. Together they educate nearly 20,000 students. That is only 0.16% of the population of about 12 million. The proportion is the lowest in the region.

The resilience of South Sudan’s higher education system is due mainly to dedicated staff, institutional partnerships and supportive governance.

Dedicated staff

South Sudanese universities lost many of their staff in the 2010 move south. Juba, with 66% of the students, lost 77% of its staff – leaving it with only 137 staff members in total. Similarly large numbers of Upper Nile and Bahr el Ghazal University staff remained in Khartoum. A World Bank report in 2012, which I used for my research but which is not available online, found that only 721 faculty were employed at the southern universities. Since then staff numbers have improved. For example, Juba’s staff increased from 291 in 2014 to 574 in early 2016. Today South Sudan has a moderate student to lecturer ratio of 28:1.

The real problem is qualifications. Most faculty are under qualified. According to the same World Bank survey only 86 of all academics in South Sudan held PhDs in 2012. Only 36 faculty were full professors, while 62 were associate professors, 76 assistant professors, 242 lecturers, and 262 teaching assistants.

This is still the most educated workforce in the country. Rigorous recruitment procedures insulate the universities from the corrupt practices in the civil service. More importantly, the dedication of the academic staff to the institution is exemplary.

While universities work to overcome the staff shortage, they depend on part-time lecturers. According to Professor John Akec and Professor Samson S. Wassara, the Vice Chancellors of Juba and Bahr el Ghazal, 31% of Juba and 60% of Bahr el Ghazal lecturers were part-timers.

Productive partnerships

The universities have developed staff development programmes with each other and internationally.

In early 2011, Juba agreed to a three-year venture with the Virginia Polytechnic and Virginia State University to train staff.

Juba also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Open University of Tanzania in August 2015 to promote distance learning.

Bahr el Ghazal entered a similar arrangement with Makerere University in Uganda and the University of Oslo in Norway. A&M University in Texas and the State University of New York signed an MoU with John Garang Memorial University in June 2010.

Some South Sudanese academics are pursuing postgraduate studies at Makerere University, the University of Zambia and the University of Zimbabwe.

Professors in other universities also supervise some of Juba’s graduate students.

Universities share the meagre facilities they have. Juba and Bahr el Ghazal, which were least affected by the conflict, support their colleagues in John Garang, Rumbek and particularly Upper Nile. The latter has moved to Juba because of insecurity in Malakal.

Supportive governance

The Ministry of Higher Education has supported the tertiary institutions through its challenges.

In addition to organising the international staff development programmes, the Ministry has improved university staff pay and given the vice-chancellors a voice in making policy.

Some of the senior officials in the ministry have an academic background. They ensure that the views of universities are taken seriously.

The vice-chancellors also draw on their connections and political insight to access resources. Members of university councils are often influential ministers or parliamentarians. In South Sudan, informality tends to yield better results than bureaucracy.

This is an edited version of an article that appeared in International Higher Education

Research shows the importance of parents reading with children – even after children can read

Many of us will be able to recall the enjoyment of shared reading: being read to and sharing reading with our parents. However, my research has found that of the 997 Year 4 and Year 6 respondents at 24 schools who took part in the 2016 Western Australian Study in Children’s Book Reading, nearly three-fifths reported that they were not being read to at home.

A sample of these children also participated in interviews, where I asked them how they felt about shared reading. While a few children did not mind no longer being read to, others were disappointed when it stopped. For example, when I asked Jason about his experience of being read to by his parents, he explained:

… they kind of stopped when I knew how to read. I knew how to read, but I just still liked my mum reading it to me.

His experience is common, with other recent research suggesting that more than one-third of Australian respondents aged six to 11 whose parents had stopped reading to them wanted it to continue.

But why is it so important for us to keep reading with our children for as long as possible?

Research has typically found that shared reading experiences are highly beneficial for young people. Benefits of shared reading include facilitating enriched language exposure, fostering the development of listening skills, spelling, reading comprehension and vocabulary, and establishing essential foundational literacy skills. They are also valued as a shared social opportunity between parents and their children to foster positive attitudes toward reading.

When we read aloud to children it is also beneficial for their cognitive development, with parent-child reading activating brain areas related to narrative comprehension and mental imagery. While most of the research in this area focuses on young children, this does not mean that these benefits somehow disappear as children age.

As young people’s attitudes towards reading reflect their experiences of reading at home and at school in childhood and beyond, providing an enjoyable shared reading experience at home can help to turn our children into life-long readers.

However, not all shared reading experiences are enjoyable. Some children described having poor quality experiences of being read to, and children did not typically enjoy reading to distracted or overly critical parents. In some cases, parents attempted to outsource this responsibility to older siblings, with mixed results.

While many children really enjoyed the social aspects of reading and being read to as valuable time with their parents, they also felt that they learned from these experiences. For example, listening was felt to provide an opportunity to extend vocabulary, and improve pronunciation. Gina recalled the advantage she lost when her parents stopped reading to her, as:

… when they did read to me when I was younger, I learnt the words; I would like to learn more words in the bigger books and know what they are so I could talk more about them.

Similarly, Craig explained how being read to enabled his academic advantage in literacy, as “they were teaching me how to say more words”, and “that’s why I’m ahead of everyone in spelling and reading and English”. When this stopped “just because my mum thought I was smart enough to read on my own and started to read chapter books”, Craig was disappointed.

In addition, children were sometimes terrified of reading aloud in the classroom, and this fear could potentially be alleviated through greater opportunities to practice at home.

Hayden’s anxiety around reading aloud at school related to his lack of confidence, and his tendency to compare his skills with those of his peers. He described himself as “always standing up there shivering, my hands are shivering, I just don’t want to read, so I just start reading. And I sound pretty weird”. No-one read with him at home, so he had limited opportunity to build his confidence and skills.

This research suggests that we should not stop reading with our children just because they have learned to read independently.

We should continue reading with our children until they no longer wish to share reading with us, ensuring that these experiences are enjoyable, as they can influence children’s future attitudes toward reading, as well as building their confidence and competence as readers. It is worth the effort to find time to share this experience with our children in the early years and beyond.

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Even With Affirmative Action, Blacks and Hispanics are More Underrepresented at Top Colleges Than 35 years Ago

Title: Even With Affirmative Action, Blacks and Hispanics are More Underrepresented at Top Colleges Than 35 years Ago

Authors: Jeremy Ashkenas, Haeyoun Park and Adam Pearce

Source: The New York Times

Equitable access to a higher education remains elusive. A recent New York Times article revealed that Black and Hispanic freshman are more underrepresented at the nation’s elite colleges today than they were 35 years ago. Using fall enrollment data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the authors analyzed 100 schools ranging from public flagship universities to the Ivy League. Despite decades of affirmative action, the analysis revealed that the share of black students at elite schools has remained relatively constant since 1980, while the share of Hispanic students attending elite schools has declined.

Finding ways to promote racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic diversity in higher education is a social and economic imperative. Improving access for racial/ethnic minority populations will require that institutions further bolster efforts to target recruitment and outreach to encourage them to apply and enhance recruitment and additional consideration for community college transfers.

Now we know most international students go home after their courses – the vilification must end

Net migration to the UK has fallen to its lowest level in three years, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS). This fall is largely attributed to a significant increase in the number of EU nationals leaving the UK since June 2016, when the country voted for Brexit.

Alongside these statistics came news that previous assumptions about international students overstaying their visas were incorrect. Whereas previous estimates put the figures on overstaying at around 100,000, now the ONS claims that a mere 4,617 did in 2016-17. This correction has been brought about by a new system of border checks on exit implemented in 2016. The figures indicated that 97% of international students from outside the European Economic Area are now thought to leave before their visa expires.

There has been longstanding frustration from the UK higher education sector about the inclusion of students within net migration statistics. Universities have lobbied hard against portrayals of students as people intent on coming to the country through a back door to stay and work illegally.

The new figures suggest the opposite: international students have been found to be honest, after all. The fact that this has come as a surprise to government leaves a very bad taste in the mouth indeed, and reflects an ongoing – possibly pernicious – stereotyping and misrepresenting of international students.

Clearly, there needs to be a fresh evaluation of assumptions that are taken for granted about international students in the UK. Perhaps this might begin with the plans, also announced by the government, to invite a panel of experts to consider the economic impact that international students have had and are having on the UK labour market.

Over the past few years, Britain has become a hostile place for prospective overseas students. This hostility can be traced in part to Theresa May’s time as home secretary from 2010 to 2016, when she made it her mission to crack down on so-called bogus colleges (over 900 were reportedly closed) – blatant abusers, as she saw it, of the UK’s immigration system. Since then, anti-immigrant sentiment disseminated by groups such as Migration Watch UK and a reliance on defective snap-shot surveys, have led to an overestimation of the number of international students “abusing” the system and overstaying their visas.

Despite many calls by universities, some in the media, several cabinet ministers, and others, to end the policy of counting international students in overall net migration numbers, the government’s attempts to reduce numbers of immigrants to the UK have included this group. They have been seen as an easy target.

The “discovery”, with these new statistics, that most international students leave after their studies end must now reinforce the case that they should not be counted as immigrants in the traditional sense.

Other options available

For many people, however, the finding that 97% of non-EEA students on study visas leave the UK after completing their studies will come as no surprise. The tedious association drawn by the Conservative government between international students and illegality is now having an impact on the numbers choosing to come to the UK – numbers have recently, for the first time in many years, been falling.

The UK has always ranked second (behind the US) as the foremost global destination for international students, but the international higher education landscape is changing, and UK arrogance and complacency will have a damaging longer-term impact on higher education and the knowledge economy at large. The UK is one of the few countries in the world without a strategy to grow international student numbers.

The benefits that international students bring to the UK are manifold, and far exceed financial calculations of student fees. Students bring knowledge and ideas, they bring social and cultural diversity, they enrich and support UK universities, and they spend money beyond the confines of their degree course.

Yet students are looking elsewhere: to countries in Europe offering English-language tuition, for example, or to the US, Canada and Australia. Even China (the largest source country of international students) has started to attract students from the wider region, potentially damaging the UK international higher education market.

Understanding the landscape

The growth in transnational higher education, where countries “off-shore” provision of higher education (with some setting up campuses abroad), will also undoubtedly have an impact on the numbers of international students choosing to come, physically, to the UK to study. Some will prefer the cheaper and easier option of studying for a UK or other degree at or nearer to home.

The UK needs to cease its hostile positioning of international students and start to attract them – and even entice them to stay and work in the UK after graduation. Experts who research international student migration also know about the relative value of qualifications gained overseas and how value varies geographically. For example, a UK degree has far more value to an international student graduate “back home” (where it is a relatively rarefied commodity) than it has for them in the UK, where graduate jobs are still highly competitive. This means that many people use international student mobility as a stepping stone towards future international mobility, rather than as a final destination in itself.

One would hope that many of those who leave the UK after study would indeed one day return (having amassed many happy memories of living and studying in Britain), bringing with them cultural and economic value and skills. But in the medium term at least, they will go elsewhere.

The bottom line is that it is really not surprising that the overwhelming vast majority of international students comply with visa regulations. We need to be far more critical and self-reflective about levels of bigotry and open hostility surrounding attitudes to international migrants in the UK, including international students.

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Religion in Australian schools: an historical and contemporary debate

In a nation that is increasingly secular, religion still plays a vital role in the way we run our country. In this series, we examine the role of religion in Australian politics and education.

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Australia maintains one of the highest concentrations of religious schools compared to other OECD countries. This proportion fits with the higher proportion of students who are enrolled in private schools in Australia.

Approximately 30% of all schools in Australia are affiliated with a religion, or 94% of private schools.

Research from the Centre For Independent Studies compared this proportion of religious schools in Australia to countries such as Sweden (2% of schools are religious), the US (10% of all schools), and the Netherlands (60% of all schools).

Religious schools in Australia predominantly consist of Anglican and Christian. But there are numerous religious affiliations represented in schools, and also diverse ways of practising religion.

Contextually, our population is shifting (and increasing). We have a rising population of minority religious groups; a sharp increase of people identifying with “no religion” on the census (29.6%); and a declining population of individuals identifying with Christianity. However, Christianity continues to be the dominant religion (57.7%).

But how an individual identifies on the Census does not readily translate to choosing a religious or non-religious school.

A brief history of religious schools in Australia

Historically speaking, religion in schools has always been contentious. This is a contentious issue in many parts of the world. The question of whether to include religion in schools is conflated with our views around the purpose of education.

In other words, what is the social purpose of education? What kind of views, ideologies and values do we want our children to learn in school? The topic of sex education and abstinence education is often paired with this debate.

As a democratic society, we will all have various responses to these questions.

The fact that religion is contentious, and not a unified consensus, was a motivation for the original foundation of our state or public schooling system.

In the state of Victoria, the Education Act founded our schools on the principle of “free, secular and compulsory”.

It was argued that secular education would remove religious discrimination and unite the community. Leading campaigners argued that religion should be taught in church and at home, rather than in schools.

Even though state schools were founded on secular principles, they were far from equitable or accessible for all.

The education acts were established in the context of the Stolen Generations, genocide and endemic racism towards Indigenous children. Indigenous people did not gain the right to vote until much later, in 1965.

Historians claim that our earlier schools were largely influenced by arguments around biological determinism and eugenics. Reportedly, leading commentators argued that you could measure a child’s head to determine their ability for academic work. Biological determinism disadvantaged poor children and Indigenous children.

Religious schools in contemporary times

Historically speaking, and also constitutionally, Australia is a secular country. Following this, each state and territory maintains slightly different policies around the inclusion or exclusion of religion in schools.

In Victoria, for example, the state department follows the Education and Training Reform Act. This act stipulates that public school education must be secular. Schools are not permitted to promote “any particular religious practice, denomination or sect, and must be open to adherents of any philosophy, religion or faith”.

Some groups, such as the Australian Secular Lobby, argue that the policy commitment to secularism in state schools is being eroded.

They have identified four key areas of concern:

• the National School Chaplaincy Program, which provides funding for schools to employ a chaplain (government funding for this program has recently increased);

• religious instruction classes conducted during school hours, predominantly by evangelical religious groups (this can be an “opt-out” or “opt-in” arrangement. In the state of Victoria, this is now held at lunchtime or out of school hours);

• state funding for religious schools; and

• the teaching of creationism in schools.

On the other hand, lobbyist groups such as the Australian Christian Lobby are highly active in campaigning for greater inclusion of religion in schools.

The Australian Christian Lobby has been very proactive in lobbying against the Safe Schools program. This is an example of how sex education, and sexuality, becomes conflated with religion.

A commitment to secularism?

Constitutionally, Australia is committed to secularism. However, the way in which this translates to schools, and the inclusion or exclusion of religion in schools, is slippery.

Religion and religious instruction is taken up differently across states and territories. This is influenced by the state political party, and fluctuates across voting periods. This often results in rapid changes to policy, and volatility.

It is fair to argue, then, that religion in schools is an ongoing contentious issue. This is strongly indicated by the ongoing debates and controversies surrounding government funding for religious schools.

While we may be secular on paper, government policy takes a largely empathetic approach to religion in schools, with a stronger preference for Christianity.

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Read other articles in the series here.

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South African universities need to rethink how they invest their millions

Universities are no longer simply institutions of learning. Over the past 50 years, they have also become important players in global financial markets. They have become institutional investors.

Universities have to decide what to do with the pension fund contributions of their staff. They also receive large monetary donations from alumni and other private donors. This money – millions, sometimes billions of dollars – goes into university investment funds. These can be managed internally or delegated to investment managers.

Harvard University in the US has the biggest endowment fund in the world with USD$32.7 billion, while university endowment funds in the UK hold between £2.5 million and £1 billion. Pension funds in the US and UK are even more substantial. For example, the California University pension fund boasts more than USD$70 billion.

University funds in southern Africa are much smaller, but some are still significant. According to our calculations, the universities with the largest endowments are all in South Africa, with the top five representing a little less than USD$1 billion collectively. The pension funds of the top 10 universities in the region come to around USD$3,6 billion.

The question of how universities choose to invest all this money is increasingly coming under scrutiny. In the US, Europe, Australia and New Zealand universities’ pension funds and endowment funds are starting to align their investment portfolios with the social concerns of their students and staff.

Putting assets to work for a better world

In the 1970s student and staff activists at US universities put serious pressure on their managements to stop investing in companies involved in the Vietnam war or, later on, in apartheid South Africa.

Today climate change is the issue that’s increasingly dominating the activist agenda on university campuses. Since 2012, 350.org, a climate change activist movement, has been pushing for total disinvestment from fossil fuels – with some significant victories . Student activists in the US have also called successfully for disinvestment from prisons.

In 2005 the UN established a responsible investment coalition called the Principles for Responsible Investment. Signatories pledge to invest according to six principles, aiming to achieve long-term sustainable investment returns and benefits for society as a whole. So far over 1000 investment managers have signed up, making it the biggest coalition of this kind in the world.

A few academic institutions have signed up too. Harvard’s USD$35 billion University Endowment Scheme joined in 2014. And at least four retirement funds, endowment funds or foundations linked to tertiary education institutions in the US and Europe signed up this year. As was the case with Harvard, this has often happened under pressure from student activists.

Progress at South African universities

So far no universities in South Africa or Africa have signed the principles. But there are signs that the idea of responsible investment is starting to gain some traction – especially within the heightened activism at South African universities.

For example, the South Africa fossil free disinvestment campaign has made significant progress at the University of Cape Town. After a four-year campaign, the university’s convocation of alumni and students this year voted to support a motion to disinvest from fossil fuels.

The Rhodes Must Fall movement also brought the issue of workers’ exploitation into focus. It accused leadership at the University of Cape Town of having blood on its hands for being invested in Lonmin at the time of the Marikana Massacre.

This was closely followed by nationwide Fees Must Fall protests. Protesters called on government to provide free education for all. In doing so, they challenged the idea that universities should operate as businesses according to free market principles. They also challenged the role of the university in society by calling for decolonisation of the institution.

Since then the University of Cape Town’s council has agreed to design a responsible investment policy. This makes it the first known Southern African university to do so.

Paradigm shift

For this movement to truly take off in Southern Africa’s universities, there needs to be a paradigm shift at the level of university management.

As stressed by the University of California, becoming a responsible investor is not about giving up on financial returns. Rather it’s about finding ways to achieve these while addressing societal challenges and opportunities. A responsible investor can decide to disinvest from environmentally and socially harmful sectors, but also to support new investment opportunities such as renewable energy.

An institutional investor that takes its responsibility towards future generations seriously should reflect on its values to take informed decisions on how financial returns can be better achieved. Fortunately it’s becoming easier to do this thanks to a surge in innovative investment strategies and funds that seek to achieve both good financial returns and positive social impacts. The African Investing for Impact Barometer – a research project that we run for the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the UCT Graduate School of Business – charts the rise of opportunities like this and shows that impact investing on the continent is booming.

This trend, combined with activism, can persuade universities to become more proactive, creative and responsible investors.

Student and staff activists have clearly begun to interrogate the links between social and environmental issues and their universities’ investment choices. For university management, these questions present an opportunity to think about how their investment portfolios can be used address the social concerns of their students and staff. Universities – being both institutional investors and places of education – can ultimately find improved investment solutions that create a more sustainable future for the generations of learners to come.

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Religious classes in schools must adapt to fit a changing Australia

In a nation that is increasingly secular, religion still plays a vital role in the way we run our country. In this series, we examine the role of religion in Australian politics and education.

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The role and place of religion in state schools has hit national headlines again in recent weeks. In Queensland, controversy has arisen over a proposed policy to restrict proselytising by students. And the New South Wales government’s religious education program, in which students not taking part in the classes pick up litter or do colouring in, has come under renewed criticism.

Religion forms part of state schooling via specific religious instruction referred to as special religious education (SRE) or special religious instruction (SRI), the National School Chaplaincy Program (NSCP), and general religious instruction.

The last of these forms part of a student’s general cultural education, and rarely causes controversy. But the first two have been the source of intense debate.

States differ in approach

All states and territories currently provide some form of SRI or SRE in their education acts. However, the way in which the religious instruction is offered varies from state to state.

For example, Western Australia and NSW operate an opt-out system, while Victoria operates an opt-in system. In the first system it is presumed students will attend religious instruction class, while in the second the presumption is reversed.

The availability of diverse options for SRI and SRE classes also varies.

Western Australia has only three providers: YouthCARE, WA Baha’i Centre of Learning, and a Catholic SRE program. By contrast, the NSW Department of Education lists 110 authorised providers including Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh, Vedic and Baha’i – although the majority of providers are Christian.

The Victorian and NSW systems provide the greatest contrast. In Victoria special religious instruction can only be offered outside of normal class hours (such as before or after school or during lunchtimes). In NSW, SRE classes are conducted during normal class times and schools are to ensure that:

… no academic instruction or formal school activities occur during time set aside for SRE/SEE.

Special Education in Ethics (SEE) classes are offered in some schools for students who opt out of the SRE program. However, ethics classes are currently not available in all schools.

A Howard government initiative

The National School Chaplaincy Program (NSCP) is another source of controversy.

The program was first introduced in 2007 under the Howard government. It involves the federal government funding the provision of chaplaincy services in both state and non-government schools. While chaplains already operated in state schools, the NSCP dramatically increased their number.

In 2012 and again in 2014, Queensland man Ron Williams challenged the constitutional validity of the NSCP in the High Court. In both cases the court found that the method used to fund the program was unconstitutional. However, the religious aspects of the NSCP did not breach the Constitution.

The federal government remedied the funding deficiencies with the program by funding the program via the states. Today the program operates in more than 3,000 schools nationwide, with funding secured until 2018.

While some have called for an end to religious programs such as SRE and SRI and the NSCP in state schools, a better way forward would be to standardise and restructure these programs by:

• operating all SRI/SRE programs nationwide on an opt-in basis, which would ensure children whose parents do not wish them to attend the classes do not accidentally end up taking part;

• enhancing their provision by providing schools, students and parents with meaningful choices in the provision of SRI/SRE and chaplaincy programs;

• ensuring that a range of religious options are available to students wishing to take SRI/SRE along with chaplains from diverse religious backgrounds, which is important in Australia’s multi-faith society; and

• offering students who do not take part in SRE/SRI meaningful alternatives. The NSW ethics classes are a good start, but need to be made available to more students.

Quality curriculum and training

A major challenge of the SRI/SRE programs is that they are predominantly delivered by volunteers. As a result, the quality and appropriateness of the material delivered can vary significantly between providers.

Recently in NSW, the pastor of an approved SRE provider was reported as describing the Quran as “a virus”, and Islam as “culturally incompatible with Western Christian values”.

In approving SRE/SRI providers, state education departments must ensure each provider not only has an appropriate curriculum but also provides adequate training for its volunteers.

As Australia’s religious demographics continue to change in the coming years and decades the place of religion in state school education will continue to be controversial.

Rather than responding with kneejerk reactions to controversial incidents state education departments, SRE/SRI providers and chaplaincy providers must evolve their programs to keep up with the needs of all state school children – both the religious and non-religious.

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Read other articles in the series here.

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Diversity Among Higher Education Admission Professionals Is More Important Than Ever

By David Hawkins & Tara Nicola

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The population of students entering higher education is more diverse than at any point in our nation’s history, with continued, significant growth ahead. According to data from the Western Interstate Commission on Higher Education, 45 percent of the country’s public high school graduates will be non-white by 2020.

As the high school population in the United States grows increasingly diverse, so too should those professionals who work on college campuses. Research has shown that improving the diversity of university faculty and staff is important: It improves the learning outcomes of students (Milem, 2003) while also creating a more inclusive campus climate where incidents of discrimination and bias are less prevalent (U.S. Department of Education, 2016).

Diversity is especially critical in university admission offices. Admission counselors not only serve as the face of their respective institutions to prospective students, they also are responsible for shaping the future of the university through admitting each incoming class. However, the latest research from our organization, the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC), suggests university admission offices are far from diverse.

In November 2016, NACAC, in collaboration with the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRAO), undertook a study of 559 institutional chief admission officers to better understand their career paths, aspirations and primary responsibilities in the enrollment management field. Data revealed that an astounding 85 percent of survey participants were white—only 8 percent identified as Black/African American, and even fewer identified as Asian/Pacific Islander, American Indian/Alaskan Native or multi-racial.

This data mirrors results from a 2014 NACAC survey that indicated 80 percent of all admission officers, including entry- and senior-level professionals, at U.S. institutions identified as white, non-Hispanic. Strikingly, communities of color were underrepresented within all segments of the admission profession; this was especially true at the senior level, where only 16 percent of directors of admission were non-white.

Our data further show not only that administrators of color had lower average lengths of tenure in their position than their white peers, but also that they were the most likely to leave the admission counseling field altogether. Only 14 percent of white, non-Hispanic professionals were seeking a new career outside of admissions, but 73.7 percent of Black, American Indian/Alaskan Native, Asian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic and multi-racial respondents were exploring other opportunities (NACAC, 2014).

Issues concerning diversity—including the retention of administrators of color—is not limited to the admission counseling profession. Studies have found more generally that despite higher education institutions increasingly championing the importance of diversity on their campuses, their staff are overwhelmingly homogenous. In fact, 2013 employment data from the U.S. Department of Education indicated that minorities represented only a quarter of all student affairs employees in postsecondary institutions (Snyder et al., 2016). This trend is further reflected in senior leadership, where the percentage of college presidents who are racial or ethnic minorities stands at just 16.8 percent (American Council on Education, 2017).

Factors Affecting Diversity in Higher Education Administration

So why are there so few minorities in higher education administration? As researchers Wolfe & Dilworth (2015) describe, three factors are largely to blame: leaks in the educational pipeline, insufficient recruitment efforts and low retention rates.

First, there is the issue of supply. Although the postsecondary participation and completion rates of students of color have significantly increased over the past century, white students are still the most likely to attend and graduate from college. This is confirmed by 2013 data from the U.S. Department of Education, which indicates that 66 percent of bachelor’s degrees and 61 percent of master’s qualifications were awarded to white students (U.S. Department of Education, 2013). Hostile campus climates, especially at predominantly white institutions, and insufficient financial aid represent two additional elements contributing to the attrition of underserved students in higher education (Hurtado & Guillermo-Wann, 2013).

Another factor is attracting individuals of color to the higher education administration profession and working to ensure that search committees are racially and ethnically diverse and aware of their own biases and preferences. Retention is also a significant hurdle. The research literature has identified a number of barriers to retention that administrators of color face, including inhospitable working environments; limited access to mentoring and sponsorship programs; marginalization; and tokenism (Wolfe & Dilworth, 2015).

Seminal work by M.J. Barr in 1990 identified barriers to retention specific to African American administrators, including a lack of a professional identity and strenuous working conditions. These factors hold true for the admission counseling profession nearly 30 years on, where professionals work demanding hours while simultaneously navigating a career that lacks a defined path. Because there is no set trajectory for advancement in the admission counseling field, administrators often look outside of higher education for job opportunities. This is especially true at the entry-level, where the annual turnover rate exceeds 30 percent (NACAC, 2014).

What Can Be Done?

Research has identified a number of practical steps that postsecondary institutions can implement to strengthen the retention of administrators of color. Jerlando Jackson (2001) outlined eight such practices that colleges and universities should consider:

• Commit to the principles of diversity by offering diversity and/or cultural competency training to all personnel.
• Emphasize diversity in the recruitment process through actively seeking a diverse group of candidates and ensuring all university staff involved in the hiring process are aware of the university’s diversity goals.
• Establish an orientation program to introduce new administrators to stakeholders in the local community as well as other staff, faculty, and students on campus.
• Develop a mentoring program whereby junior staff are paired with senior professionals who can guide them through navigating the political and social environments on campus.
• Offer competitive salaries that are equitable and sufficient.
• Foster open lines of communication by providing constructive feedback about an administrator’s performance.
• Empower administrators by inviting input in decision-making processes fosters a more inclusive environment, which nurtures professional growth.
• Support the professional development aspirations of administrators. Encourage participation in development opportunities offered by professional groups and other organizations both on and off campus.

An institution’s commitment to diversifying its staff is a good first step in addressing the shortage of underrepresented minority professionals in higher education administration. But it is not enough. Effectively recruiting and retaining administrators of color requires specific institutional support structures and policies developed through proactive, long-term planning. Only by explicitly addressing the factors that fuel this shortage can racial disparities be ameliorated.

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Pursuing a professional degree can be extremely stressful for students, who often experience it as a time riddled with anxiety, uncertainty, fear and financial challenge.

The emotional health of law students was recently brought to my attention in an email from a student at the University of Cape Town’s law faculty where I am the dean. The student noted a perceived hyper competitive, overly demanding and alienating environment. This, he told me, was putting the mental health of some law students under severe strain. He stated that because of the atmosphere, “the use of anti-anxiety and antidepressant medication has become the norm amongst students” and alcohol is being consumed in alarming proportions.

The disturbing email had me pondering: was this an individual case of emotional distress or did it suggest a wider problem that required urgent attention? And what kind of attention? Is there something about law school in particular that drives its students to mental health problems and substance abuse? And, if so, how can it be addressed?

In seeking answers to these questions I first looked into the University of Cape Town’s policies and practices on addressing mental health and substance abuse. I then began an investigation into the issue of mental health among law students specifically, looking at South Africa and other countries. Though most of the rigorous, scientific research on the subject has been conducted in the US, it does offer some valuable insight into what’s driving the issue and how it may be addressed.

What we know

The American media has drawn attention to issues of substance abuse and mental health among law students and lawyers. One article written about the high instances of suicides among law students and lawyers cites a study by the American Psychology Association showing that lawyers are 3.6 times more likely to suffer from depression than non lawyers.

In 2014 a comprehensive study, The Survey of Law Student Well-Being, was conducted at 15 law schools across the US. It was designed to examine and address the incidence of alcoholism and drug use, as well as mental health concerns of law students. The study found that a quarter to a third of law students reported misuse of alcohol and drugs, as well as experiencing mental health problems.

What was particularly disturbing about the findings was that a sizeable group of the students experiencing problems were reluctant to seek help. The factors that stopped them included social stigma, potential threat to job status, financial reasons, the idea that they could handle the problem themselves, or not having the time.

At South African universities, the question of student emotional wellness has been acknowledged and examined in some depth. These studies do not focus on law specifically but anecdotal evidence suggest that some law students may be experiencing similar pressure, requiring both personal and professional support and care.

All the signs seem to suggest that there is something particular to the education and training of lawyers that makes students and graduates prone to mental health problems and substance abuse. But knowing how to intervene requires a better understanding of what is driving this disturbing phenomenon.

Stresses in law

Studying law is fulfilling, rewarding and fun. But law studies are also academically tough. Success is predicated on hard work, long hours and emotional persistence. The skills of successful law graduates include resilience, perseverance and the determination and capacity to succeed despite obstacles.

This is true of other professions, but law is distinct in a few key ways.

In many ways law operates as an adversarial system with clear winners and losers. The combative prosecutor, the shrewd defence lawyer, the ruthless negotiator, the tough judge – these are all images of the strong, successful lawyer. Learning law therefore feels combative, not collaborative. This leads to a culture of competitiveness in law school, where the pressure to emulate successful lawyers is strong.

The practice of lawyering is also a more public endeavour than in other professions. Lawyers are open to public ridicule.

And because law students have to certify that they are “fit and proper” persons to practice they may feel particularly constrained to demonstrate any emotional problem, fearing that it may have an impact on their ability to be licensed to practice. They may also perceive seeking help as a sign of weakness – anathema to the perceived image of the strong lawyer.

Where to from here?

In response to the mental health challenges of its students, the University of Cape Town is pursuing a revised mental health policy for students that’s responsive to their needs and attuned to issues of inclusiveness and care.

In the law faculty, in line with the broader university-wide initiative, we are focusing on the question of how to encourage students to seek help when they need it. This means making mental health services visible, accessible, affordable and socially acceptable.

We are also addressing the way we teach law. Some aspects of the legal profession are inherently stressful. But our aim is to develop a caring institutional culture as well as solid academic support structures.

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Looking Ahead to Diversifying the College Presidency

By Jennifer R. Crandall, Lorelle L. Espinosa & Morgan Taylor

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Despite the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that set a clearer path for women and racial/ethnic minorities pursuing top leadership positions in this country’s public and private sectors, their underrepresentation remains a reality—dare we say a tradition—in the United States. Higher education’s C-suite is no exception. Findings from ACE’s American College President Study 2017 (ACPS) show that the profile of the typical college or university president remains largely the same since the first iteration of these data in 1986: an older white male. Progress in diversifying the college presidency has been steady but slow, and is insufficient if the individuals leading postsecondary institutions are to be representative of the student bodies they serve.

Consider this:

Women have comprised more than half of all college students since 1979, and projections predict they will make up nearly 60 percent by 2026. Yet women represented only 30 percent of college and university presidents in 2016. While their representation in the presidency has tripled since 1986, it only increased 4 percent in the five years between 2011 and 2016.

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People of color also remain largely underrepresented in the presidency. In 2016, racial/ethnic minorities—defined in ACPS as presidents who identified their race as other than white or who identified their ethnicity as Hispanic or Latino/a—held only 17 percent of presidencies. The representation of minority presidents has more than doubled since 1986, but parallels women presidents in that it has increased only 4 percent since 2011. On the other hand, people of color comprised approximately 42 percent of college students in 2015, and projections show that by 2026, that will increase to about 47 percent.

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ACE’s Center for Policy Research and Strategy set out to estimate when the presidency would reach gender and racial parity. Using historical ACPS data, we calculated the compounded annual growth rate to create projections of when the college presidency will reach such parity if the current growth rate remains constant. We then created additional growth scenarios to determine how a change in the growth rate would affect the projected year of reaching gender and racial parity in the presidency.

The newly released interactive ACPS data tool displays this information in addition to select findings from the American College President Study 2017 and previous iterations. Before looking ahead to exemplar programs committed to diversifying the presidency and other senior administrative positions in the field, let us first take a look what it will take for the presidency to reach gender and racial parity.

Women Presidents and Gender Parity

In an effort to diversify the presidency, ACE launched its “Moving the Needle: Advancing Women in Higher Education Leadership” initiative in 2016 with a goal of achieving 50 percent women in chief executive roles by 2030. The promising news is that if the annual growth of women in the presidency stays constant, we will reach Moving the Needle’s goal for gender parity, defined as equal representation of men and women in the presidency. Challenges nonetheless persist, not to mention that some question whether 2030 is soon enough. To meet the 2030 goal, the annual growth rate must remain constant or increase—it cannot decrease.

In addition to parity of roles, it is worth noting that other obstacles remain. For example, according to the American Association of University Women, women will likely continue to fall short in pay relative to their male counterparts. For this reason, contextual features such as culture and systems demand attention in order to eliminate inequities and barriers to entry for women who aspire to the presidency.

Minority Presidents and Racial Parity

The case of racial parity is more complex to estimate because of constant fluctuations in populations. To do so, our analysis used 2015 to 2060 population projections from the U.S. Census Bureau for three racial/ethnic groups: African Americans, Asian Americans, and Latinos/as. Racial parity occurs when the representation of each group in the presidency equals their representation in the overall U.S. population. Therefore, the percent representation for parity differs per year and for each racial/ethnic group.

Based on the current annual growth rate of 1.5 percent, parity for African American presidents will occur by 2050. However, if the growth rate in African Americans among the presidency slips by just 0.5 percent, parity will not occur by 2060. Asian Americans, on the other hand, will reach racial parity in all generated growth scenarios. Under the current 6 percent growth rate, parity in the presidency for Asian Americans will occur by 2036.

The case of racial parity for Latino/a presidents is especially troublesome and deserves particular mention considering this population’s steady growth in the United States and within higher education. In 2015, Latinos/as were the second largest racial/ethnic group enrolled in higher education, and projections show that by 2026, one in five college students will be Latino/a. Findings from 2016 ACPS data show that Latinos/as represented only 3.9 percent of college and university presidents. If the growth in the representation of Latinos/as in the presidency remains on the current trajectory, parity will not occur by 2060. In fact, based on our analysis, parity for Latino/a presidents only occurs with a 5 percent annual growth rate, and even then will not occur until 2057.

Looking Ahead

ACE’s Moving the Needle initiative is only one example of how the higher education field can work toward gender parity in the college presidency. Others include ACE’s Women’s Network, which aims to advance and support women in pursuit of leadership opportunities in higher education. Individual state networks are linked through the Women’s Network Executive Council, a group of senior women executives who serve as mentors to state coordinators and advisors to ACE in the functioning of the network. Similarly, ACE’s Spectrum Aspiring Leaders Program focuses on leadership and skill development, networking and strategic career mapping for mid-level administrators from diverse backgrounds, with an eye toward senior-level leadership.

These efforts work in concert with initiatives and recommendations of peer organizations actively working to increase gender and racial/ethnic diversity among college and university leadership:

• The American Association of State Colleges and Universities’ Millennium Leadership Initiative invests in the professional development of African American, Latino/a, and Asian and Pacific Islander senior-level leaders to ensure that institutional leadership reflects the growing diversity of the country.

• The American Association of University Women has focused efforts on shedding light on the underrepresentation of women and women of color in leadership roles, as well as causes for the gender gap in leadership, and offers recommendations on how to close the this gap.

• The Aspen Institute’s Task Force on the Future of the College Presidency examines ways in which to strengthen the college presidency in the future. Among their recommendations is the development of a more diverse presidential candidate pool through mentorship and leadership development programs, such as ACE’s Fellows Program.

As the student body and general population continue to diversify, institutions of higher education will require diverse perspectives on how best to serve an evolving demographic and situate themselves within the larger socio-political and socio-cultural landscape. This is no easy task. While meeting the needs of contemporary institutions demands cooperation across and between a constellation of efforts, it is clear that intentionality and clear pathways for women and minorities is an important component.

To this end, ACE remains dedicated to reaching gender and racial/ethnic parity in the presidency, working alongside others to further the advancement of women and people of color. We hope the information highlighted here and on the ACPS data tool open up a broader conversation around diversity in the presidency and how to best ensure the success of qualified, diverse candidates who aspire to senior leadership roles in higher education.

Iowa Regents Tuition Task Force Kicks Off

Title: Iowa Regents Tuition Task Force Kicks Off

Author: Jeff Charis-Carlson

Source: The Des Moines Register

Iowa’s public universities are presenting to the state’s Board of Regents Tuition Task Force this week on their five-year proposals for tuition pricing. The Tuition Task Force “was established to facilitate public discussion regarding the issue of tuition at Iowa’s public universities” and looks to foster collaborative solutions between the state’s legislators and public universities for minimizing tuition increases. The August 7 presentation by Mark Nook, president of the University of Northern Iowa, shared projections with numbers based on different amounts of support from state appropriations. Nook’s presentation suggests that keeping tuition increases low depends on support from their state legislature, and that continued cuts in support would result in a nearly 12 percent increase in tuition in the next fiscal year.

This review process highlights tensions that play out broadly for college and university presidents. The 2017 American College President Study, released in June, showed that the external party viewed as most supportive by the largest percentage of presidents (52 percent) was the board of regents, while the external party felt to understand their concerns the least by the largest percentage of presidents (40 percent) were state legislators.

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Fee increases still on the table after Senate committee reports on higher education changes

On Wednesday, a Senate committee reported on the government’s proposed changes to higher education.

Though more moderate than the 2014 version, the new higher education package represents groundhog day for the major political parties. The committee, chaired as it was by the Coalition, recommended passing the measures, stating that they will:

… balance the Commonwealth’s need to recover student debts over time with the need of students to access a fair and high-quality system of higher education without facing high upfront fees.

However, the Labor members of the committee dissented. They strongly argued for the bill to be rejected, arguing that:

Australian students will have to pay more, for less, sooner.

Where to next?

What are the changes?

The reforms’ explicit intent is to rein in government spending on higher education without compromising teaching quality or restricting access to higher education by making it unaffordable.

The headline changes are:

• An increase in the student contribution toward the cost of the degree to, on average, 46% for Australian students (currently they pay on average 42%).

• According to the government, the maximum cost of a Commonwealth-supported course would be A$50,000 for a four-year degree, or $75,000 for a six-year medical degree.

• Students paying for their degree through HECS-HELP would start paying it back when they earn $42,000 (the current threshold is $54,869).

• The universities would be subjected to a 2.5% funding cut (the government calls it an efficiency dividend), which amounts to around $380 million in 2019.

• Access to Commonwealth-supported places for Australian permanent residents and New Zealand students would be removed. These students would have to pay the full tuition rate. This would typically double or even triple the cost of their degree. To offset the fee increase, these students will be able to access HECS-HELP loans like Australian citizens, whereas previously they had to pay up front.

For context, when higher education reform was last attempted in 2014, proposed cuts to university teaching funding were around 20%. And student fees were to be deregulated, leading to fears that degrees could cost more than $100,000.

The 2014 proposals proved almost universally unpopular but the legislation lingered, zombie-like, for several years before being shelved. This new proposal is an attempt to press the reset button and move forward.

Those opposed to the latest proposal have pointed to reduced funding for universities, higher costs to students, and tougher loan repayment requirements.

Those supporting the changes feel the fee increases and funding cuts are moderate in comparison to the 2014 proposals, and in line with the overall fiscal reality.

How was the new reform agenda received?

Since announcing the changes, the government has received more than 1,200 submissions from a wide range of higher education stakeholders, including students and their parents.

Further submissions were made to the Senate committee. The vast majority opposed the proposed changes to student tuition fees and repayments.

The general sentiment revealed by the submissions was a belief that “students will end up paying more to get less”. This phrase, or similar versions of it, appeared in multiple submissions.

Many submissions were from permanent residents and New Zealanders, worried about the intended increase to the cost of their education. In the words of one:

I am pretty sure there are countless others who have had their dreams of studying higher education crushed … We should take care of the people living in this country, and give them a chance to progress into university, before they like us feel as though they may have to return back to their home countries just to follow their educational dreams.

In its submission, the University of South Australia supported the student fee increase but opposed the lowering of the repayment threshold.

Victoria University proposed the money raised by increasing student tuition fees should be given to the universities rather than the Commonwealth:

… in order to directly improve the student experience of those paying the fees.

All other universities either opposed the student fee increases, or avoided the issue in their submissions.

All universities opposed the proposed funding cut to the universities themselves.

What next?

In its dissenting report, Labor calculated, for example, that a graduate with a HELP debt earning $51,000 will have less disposable income than someone earning $32,000.

Labor also expressed its concern about the impact of student debt on New Zealanders and permanent residents, given they will be required to pay full fees.

Similarly, the Greens members of the committee dissented, stating that:

… young people from low socioeconomic backgrounds would be priced out of an education.

Assuming the government proceeds with the changes, the Senate will debate and vote on the bill in due course. If so, its fate lies with the minor parties and independents – just as it did the last time.

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The Sky Is Falling . . . or Is It? New Data and Reflections on International Student Enrollment

By Lucia Brajkovic and Robin Helms

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Nearly three-quarters of the 1,164 colleges and universities that responded to ACE’s 2016 Mapping Internationalization on U.S. Campuses survey reported that internationalization has accelerated at their institutions in recent years. For many of them, hosting international students is a key aspect of their internationalization strategies, reflected in both their stated priorities and resource allocations for international student recruiting—including a marked increase in the percentage of institutions that use overseas student recruiters.

However, significant shifts in foreign policy by the Trump administration have raised serious concerns about U.S. institutions’ ability to continue to attract international students. In a letter to the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security in response to the January 2017 executive order titled “Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States,” ACE President Molly Corbett Broad stated, “We fear the chilling effect this will have on the ability of international students and scholars to continue to see the U.S. as a welcoming place for study and research.”

Little actual data was available on the extent to which a “chilling effect” was in fact occurring—until recently. In July 2017, the Institute of International Education (IIE) released new data from a survey of U.S. college and university admissions officers, which provided a snapshot of international student yield rates as of last May. The study, Shifting Tides: Understanding International Student Yield for Fall 2017, was conducted by IIE in cooperation with AACRAO: American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admission Officers, the Council of Graduate Schools, the National Association of College Admissions Counselors, and NAFSA: Association of International Educators.

The findings suggest that despite highly publicized concerns that interest in the United States among international students is in decline, actual international student numbers may in fact be holding fairly steady. Although the study is based on a small sample, data provided by 112 participating institutions showed just a two percent decline in the expected yield rate (i.e., the percentage of students offered admission who accept the offer and enroll) this year compared to last year (26 to 24 percent from fall 2016 to fall 2017).

National Trends, Local Realities

At ACE, we are always interested in the results of broad-based research studies and reports released by national organizations such as IIE. But we also recognize the importance of examining the nuances and implications of the data for campuses and how key issues play out in a local context. An article in North Logan, Utah’s Herald Journal caught our attention both for its coverage of the IIE study and how it complements the data with reflections and insights on the international student experience, specifically in the United States.

In a conversation with staff, Rajika Bhandari, director of the IIE Center for Academic Mobility Research and Impact, said that the slight decline in international student yield observed in the study “could be due to the political climate,” but that it’s a trend that predates the Trump administration. “Even prior to everything that’s played out this year, the U.S. was already beginning to see some flattening of numbers in the number of international students coming to the U.S.,” she said.

As one of the reasons for the decline in yield, Bhandari said that in recent years, an increasing number of international students have chosen to study in their home country or region. And actually, the two percentage point drop in international yield is congruent with shifts in the domestic (U.S.) student yield reported by institutions (a decline from 30 to 28 percent during the same time period).

The IIE study concludes that overall, responding campuses are expressing cautious optimism that international enrollments will not decline as much as previously feared, and that some institutions may even see increases due to recent efforts such as “you are welcome here” campaigns—reflected, for example, in a video produced by the University of Arizona.

Concerns remain, however, particularly regarding students’ countries or regions of origin—namely the Middle Eastern countries directly affected by the latest iteration of President Trump’s travel ban, which the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments over this fall. Securing and maintaining a visa has been reported as the top worry by these students, as well as for nearly 50 percent of higher education institutions that responded to the IIE survey.

The Herald Journal’s piece underscores these concerns with perspectives from local students. Amir Malakooti, a Utah State University graduate student from Iran, told the Herald Journal he came to study in the United States because it is “the leading country to do research.” He plans to pursue a Ph.D. here, too. However, his friends are choosing to apply to universities in Canada and Europe, as they perceive that “it is difficult” to be an international student in the United States.

“Even me, myself. Before the travel ban happened, previously I didn’t want to apply to a Canadian university,” Malakooti said. “Then, it happened and I said OK.”

Beyond the Numbers

So is the sky falling when it comes to international students in the United Stated? It’s hard to say. As Chronicle of Higher Education staff writer Karin Fischer noted in a recent article, “The simple fact is, we won’t know for certain about the true impact of the ban—and the ‘America first’ sentiments that birthed it—until students arrive on American campuses for the start of the fall semester.”

And then there is the longer term. As Philip Altbach and Hans de Wit wrote in Times Higher Education, “At a national seminar of international higher education professionals that we recently hosted at Boston College, speakers were still hopeful that they could rise above the bigger political picture and provide a welcome on their own campuses that was so warm that it would sustain their international student numbers through word of mouth. We believe that such hopes are misplaced. Optimism is unsustainable in the current reality, and we predict the acceleration of a trend towards more plurality in global student flows that will anyway take place in the coming decades.”

Regardless of where any of us fall on the optimism-pessimism spectrum, rather than dwelling on the uncertainty, perhaps our best approach is focus on what we do know: The international students at our institutions deserve a top-quality educational experience. ACE’s Mapping data suggest that we have some work to do when it comes to programs and support for international students—efforts in this area have not progressed as much as the notable emphasis on recruiting suggests they should have.

Whether their numbers go up or down—this fall or over the next 10 years—working to ensure that international students feel safe, welcome and supported on our campuses is most certainly good policy and practice.

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For resources on recruiting and supporting international students and other internationalization topics, see ACE’s Internationalization Toolkit.

Affirmative action around the world

Primary schools are losing more and more male teachers, so how can we retain them?

The percentage of male primary school teachers in Australia has decreased in recent decades, from 30.24% in 1983 to 18.26% in 2016. Education authorities have responded to this with recruitment-focused initiatives, such as scholarships and quota systems.

But the continuing decline suggests more attention needs to be given to retaining those already in the profession.

Why the decline?

Men often leave teaching because of the gender-related challenges they face.

My PhD research has found the biggest challenges male primary school teachers face are:

• uncertainty about physical contact with students;

• an increased workload due to expectations to take on masculine roles; and

• social isolation caused by difficulties in developing positive professional relationships with colleagues.

If male primary teachers have more effective coping strategies they might be able to deal better with these challenges, and consequently persist in the profession.

What are some coping strategies?

Participants in this study detailed several coping strategies and supports that enabled them to deal with these challenges and persist with teaching.

Some men described how they dealt with their fear and uncertainty about physical contact by employing a strict no-contact policy for their own self-protection. They used humour and playing sport with students at break times to build relationships with their students in ways that did not involve the physical contact strategies that their female colleagues used.

Other strategies they described included:

• setting up their classrooms to minimise incidental physical contact;

• never being one-on-one with students; and

• moving to a public location to talk with students.

Many indicated they were happy to give an upset child a hug. However, they were fearful of other people perceiving the contact as inappropriate and making a career-ending accusation.

Those men who were prepared to make the same physical contact as their female colleagues were generally older, more experienced and had worked in their schools for many years. This had allowed them to develop trust and rapport within their school community.

Several participants discussed the gendered double standards on physical contact. They noted the media sensationalising of inappropriate behaviour by male teachers, with much less attention when accusations were later proved false.

Teaching has intensified

Although the substantial intensification of workload in recent decades has affected all teachers, previous research has noted that male primary school teachers report higher workloads than their female colleagues. This is because of expectations to perform roles such as behaviour management, manual labour, sports coaching, and being responsible for subjects such as science and ICT.

Participants reported they were expected to perform these roles, and seemed to have accepted this as a part of their job.

Men primarily employed strategies such as arriving early at school and recycling lessons from previous years to use their time more effectively, and cope when additional behaviour issues arose. They also sought help from other men working at the school, such as the groundsman to help with manual labour.

Many said strong support from their principal was a vital component of their ability to cope with this challenge.

Participants said they generally got on well with their female colleagues. But they felt socially isolated because they did not have many colleagues, particularly male ones, with common interests. This isolation was particularly evident in the staff room at break times.

Men coped with this challenge by using strategies such as being proactive in identifying common interests for conversation topics, developing positive professional relationships with trusted female colleagues they could rely on for support, and pursuing out-of-school hobbies such as clubs and sport. There they could interact with more men and “balance” their female-dominated work environment.

Men also described self-isolating behaviours such as reading the paper and going back to their office to do work.

Several themes emerged as participants described their strategies for dealing with these gender-related challenges. These included the influence of traditional constructions of how men should and shouldn’t act, schools perpetuating these societal constructions, and the importance of having strong support from colleagues and school leaders.

These factors all need to be considered if more men are to be retained in teaching.

From PostEverything: Free Tuition? Programs Should Focus on Students Who Started and Had To Stop.

Title: Free Tuition? Programs Should Focus on Students Who Started and Had To Stop.

Author: Sanford J. Ungar

Source: The Washington Post’s PostEverything Blog

A recent blog post by Sanford J. Ungar in The Washington Post discusses the need to focus policy conversations around increasing college enrollment to those who have some college education, but no degree. According to the post, approximately 36 million American adults (age 25 to 64) started their college education, but never completed a credential. Ungar suspects that if students understood the non-academic benefits of attending college, such as living healthier lifestyles, as well as their financial return on investment, more adults would re-enroll in college.

In the post, Ungar also discusses reasons in which students may suspend their education, explaining that students face other pressures beyond securing the financial means to pay for higher education—“life intervenes,” which requires solutions beyond tuition assistance. This, in turn, requires policymakers to be creative in designing initiatives encouraging adult students to re-enroll. Ungar closes the post with policy recommendations to increase enrollment among adult students.

To read the full blog, please see The Washington Post’s website.