University of Wollongong communications and media student Robin Pierson won't be affected by sweeping changes to higher education funding proposed by the Federal Government.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Nevertheless the Wollongong Undergraduate Student Association (WUSA) education officer doesn't want thousands of future students to pay 113 per cent more to study humanities and communications courses in years to come.
That's exactly what will happen if Federal Education Minister Dan Tehan gets his way.
In an effort to produce graduates for high-priority employment areas, Mr Tehan wants to reduce fees for university courses in health, teaching and science but increase the fee cost of popular humanities, law and commerce degrees.
The overhaul of student and government contributions announced on Friday will fund an extra 39,000 university places by 2023 and 100,000 by the end of the decade in response to surging demand for tertiary education.
"To deliver cheaper degrees in areas of expected employment growth, students who choose to study more popular degrees will make a higher contribution," Mr Tehan said in an address to the National Press Club.
"A cheaper degree in an area where there's a job is a win-win for students ... It's common sense. If Australia needs more educators, more health professionals and more engineers then we should incentivise students to pursue those careers."
But Pierson felt Mr Tehan was hedging his bets.
"Look, he says this is not about deregulating fees and this is not about $100,000 degrees, but what he is doing is pitting students against each other," she said.
"If you are a nursing student, of course you shouldn't have to pay exorbitant amount of fees for your degree but nobody should pay enormous amount of fees. Degrees should be free.
"They keep attacking the arts degrees because they don't make as much money for the economy but the fact that they won't put medicine as a necessary degree really highlights what a money making scheme universities are."
Dr Adam Lucas, the Bachelor of Arts academic program director at UOW, fears Mr Tehan "is going to devastate the humanities in Australia".
"Increasing the price is going to discourage students from choosing a humanities degrees," Dr Lucas said.
"The BA is the cheapest of the courses at university to deliver. So it is imposing additional costs on students way above what it actually costs to deliver the subjects if Tehan gets his way.
"It is also another excuse to cut staff in humanities departments throughout Australia."
Dr Lucas added the Federal Government considers the university sector and the arts sector to be "their ideological enemies".
"This is why we have received no real support from the Federal Government as a result of COVID-19 and they are continuing to target those sectors and areas of the universities which they consider to be not kosher or not worthy of support.
"It is as though they have a monopoly of understanding pedagogy and the tertiary sector. Their attitude is absolutely absurd frankly."
UOW backs plan that slashes cost of priority degrees, but increases popular degree fees
University of Wollongong Vice-Chancellor Paul Wellings welcomed the proposed higher education reforms announced by Federal Education Minister Dan Tehan on Friday.
"These reforms will support us to strengthen our focus on domestic students, and enhance the mutually beneficial relationships we have with business and government," Professor Wellings said.
"We are particularly pleased that there will be support for programs that assist Indigenous, regional and low SES students to have access to a university education."
If Mr Tehan gets his way the cost of humanities and communications courses will more than double, with a year of full-time study costing $14,500, up from $6684 this year.
Fees for law and commerce will increase 28 per cent to $14,500 a year, up from $11,155. A full three-year program in these disciplines will cost students about $43,500 as the government slashes its funding contribution.
Teaching, nursing, clinical psychology, English, languages, maths and agriculture courses will cost $3700 a year, down by 46 to 62 per cent. Fees for science, health, architecture, environmental science, IT and engineering will drop 20 per cent, with a year of study costing $7700.
We depend on subscription revenue to support our journalism. If you are able, please subscribe here. If you are already a subscriber, thank you for your support.
Agron Latifi
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
