Content
University Must Remain Focused on Regional Mission
25 June 2005
The extensive university reforms being considered nationally
have this week provoked a discussion about a merger between two or
three Western Australian universities, and then speculation about
whether there is a likelihood that other mergers could occur
elsewhere in the sector.
Adding to the speculation and controversy, next Monday's 'Four
Corners' will examine the crisis of under-funding in universities,
their pursuit of commercial activity, and how internationalisation
is in some places compromising standards.
It is a difficult time for some of those universities that are
in the spotlight.
My view is that this University is not, and will not, be the
subject of merger talks, nor have our activities and standards been
compromised in any way. Let me elaborate briefly why I believe this
is the case.
Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s community activism on the
Sunshine Coast led to the presence of a University College being
established in 1994 and opened in 1996. It was to be reviewed to be
an independent university but not before 2006. The compelling
arguments that were developed then are still relevant: that the
Sunshine Coast is a distinctive, high-growth region, and that
population and that region need their own university.
It was a similar background that we advanced at the time of
developing an academic case that led to university status being
achieved within eighteen months of opening. It was also a similar
case that led Dr Nelson to provide more growth to this University
last year than to any other single campus.
The University is a great success story: it is growing its
profile rapidly; it has guaranteed student growth; it is serving
its community in a range of economic and cultural ways; it is not
proliferating unsustainable campuses, it has not expanded its
commercial or international activity to become too heavily reliant
on them; it has a strong staff; and has consistently highly
satisfied students.
This is a recipe for further independent growth.
The University will expand but will remain one of human scale,
and will prove that 'big' (say, over 20,000) is not always better.
We will grow with the region, be directly engaged with it, and
protect high standards. For those reasons, USC is not and will not
be in the spotlight for either a merger or be criticised for
lowering the standards of a university experience.
USC has proved itself across the last ten years, and on that
basis will progress to become one of the most exciting universities
of human scale.
Metropolitan mergers make some sense, with duplicated premises
sometimes next to each other. That pattern is not replicated in
most of the rest of Australia, although there are some predatory
overlaps, the motives for which vary.
As far as the Sunshine Coast and its hinterland go, we are the
only University headquartered here and with all our resources and
energies directed to the betterment of the region. The more we are
in turn supported, the more we can do directly and indirectly for
the region. No other university now, or in the future can make the
same claims.
We have always acknowledged that our platform for success is
anchoring ourselves in this community and helping the region expand
its economic appeal without compromising the quality of life
here.
If we were merged, the Sunshine Coast focus would be severely
compromised and much of our momentum dissipated. There are no
natural partners. We have a distinctive community of interest.
It is important that in this period of rapid and I suspect
traumatic sectoral change, that we as a University, backed by our
regional community, do not lose focus, and that we do continue
working together on the successes we have created. In that way we
will continue to forge the country's most dynamic non-metropolitan
university of the Twenty-first Century.
Professor Paul Thomas is Vice-Chancellor of University of
the Sunshine Coast