Ninety three percent of the population, who haven't been anywhere near a university, and who are heartily sick of the idiots who have, couldn't care less about another self-inflicted crisis.

the main crisis in universities is the dumbing down and brainwashing of its clients. Lowering of grades to keep international money flows coming, no free speech and pseudo science replacing basic biology is just the tip of the iceberg. Universities are teaching people how not to think.

That's right. We don't care about whether teachers, doctors, nurses, osteopaths, or pathologists are well educated. Standards don't matter to any of us, right? Ninety nine percent of people need doctors, teachers, nurses, and God help us- lawyers.

Waverly,

Of course universities are needed for training in certain professions: like medicine, law, engineering etc. They are NOT needed for nursing, journalism, teaching and all the stupid courses introduced to lure in more punters who will never gain employment because they have a piece of paper saying they did women's studies or some such rubbish. Only 27% of Australians hold degrees, many of them a waste of time and taxpayers' money.

This crisis is strickly down to the funding paradigm. Even as we commit more money than all the universities would require to be fully funded, to welfare for the rich. Negative gearing of real estate investment, subsidised super, And massive tax avoidance by the biggest income entities in the land.

The funding paradigm should be a means-tested endowment the parents receive so that any kid that has the intellectual capability to do STEM, is able to qualify!

And it should include a real living away from home allowance. In the knowledge for every dollar invested in tertiary education, there will be a return of not less than $2.50.

Fix the funding model and there will never ever be another funding crisis. Albeit lots of moaning and grizzling by the better off seeing their advantage and privilege dissolving before their very eyes and junior forced to compete on a level playing field for the first time?

Moreover, if our self inflicted, asinine prohibition on nuclear energy is lifted, Millions will flow into nuclear R+D.
Alan B.

ttbn,

Engineers don't need to be university trained.

There are a lot of excellent and leading engineers around who would not even get into a university let alone get through a degree program.

James Watt, one of the world's greatest engineers, didn't go to university.

When I started working in engineering in the 1970s I noticed that about 70% of engineers were not university trained.

I think technical colleges provide sufficient training for engineers.

Mr. O,

Ok. Strike engineers off the list too. The more the better.

If the tertiary education sector could get back to educating Australians who need it; dropping the stupid idea that they are an 'export industry', and allowing foreign governments to educate their own people, and stop turning out left wing twats, they could, perhaps, have the money that is wasted on the ABC transferred to them.

ttbn,

Foreign students especially Chinese don't come to Australian universities for the education.

Doing a university course in Australia is the back door to getting a permanent residency visa. When they complete their degree they don't go home but get jobs in Australia and then use that to apply for migrant status so that they don't have to go home.

That way they get around formal immigration channels. And once they are established they then get their family members into Australia through family migration procedures.

I thought everybody knew that. You didn't really think they came here to get educated did you?

Mr Opinion, I suggest many if not most Asian students are doing degrees in Australia because a degree from an Australian Uni is regarded much more highly than an Asian degree which can and is frequently earnt by merely bribing their way through the course. Many Asians who study in Australia consequently end up emigrating to other Western countries besides Australia.

jimmy2shoes,

Crap! You don't know what you are talking about.

The throngs of students especially Chinese and Indian bring into Australia two things that politicians and business leaders/owners want most from them: money and cheap labour.

Go and have a look around the big cities and see how many ex-foreign students dominate the graduate positions in the offices and professions.

They are buying an education that will get them permanent residency.

They dont all stay here, the 485 visa gives them up to 4 years after finishing the degree to stay here. PR visas are not as easy to obtain as you think, I personally know a number of Asian students who have finished their education here and obtained permanent residency in countries like Canada and the US. An Indian degree will not get you residency in those countries whilst an Australian one probably will. The US seems to be the target destination for many.

jimmy2shoes,

I suggest you take a look at LinkedIn and thumb your way through the professional profiles of people working in Sydney and Melbourne who are ex-foreign students to get an idea of the extent to which the education system has been manipulated for the purpose of getting permanent residency.

There's only one crisis with Unis, hardly any education but plenty of indoctrination !

Mr opinion, nothing wrong with using the rules legally to obtain a desired outcome. Im sure you claim all your allowances on your tax each year. Do you call that "manipulation"? I stand by my comment, these students are here primarily to obtain a Western degree, of course they will then use that degree to further their careers here or anywhere else. If there is any "manipulation" going on its the business migration scheme which is being rorted and being rorted easily.

Misopin ionated,

I live a fairly sheltered life, so I'm not really aware of any immigrants being exploited as cheap labour, apart from the scams such as 7/11 underpaying their workers, etc. Perhaps you can elaborate.

And can you differentiate between the huge variety of East, South, Central and South-East Asians ? I had a good Chinese mate at school in Darwin I and asked him, when the Japanese companies were breaking up the wrecks in the harbour, if he could tell the difference between Chinese and Japanese - he shrugged and said, no.

So presumably, you can differentiate between them and Korean, Vietnamese, Filipino, Thai, Burmese, Assamese, Uighur, Malay, Hazara, Kazakh and/or Indonesian ?

It's quite amazing what one can learn in environmental sociology ....

Joe