Obiter dicta by Professor Gavin Brown AO

Time for review

10 May 2002

The departmental paper, Higher Education at the Crossroads, is a useful set text. Although it is disappointing, inasmuch as it catalogues a series of traditional criticisms of universities, their staff, students and administration, it has the considerable virtue of raising a great many pertinent questions. In addition, the Minister, Brendan Nelson, is taking every opportunity to focus public attention on higher education and the opportunity for reform.

It has been made very clear that there is no intention of providing financial relief in the forthcoming budget and that any future increase in public expenditure must be contingent on the achievement of a package of structural changes. In this regard we should transcend the irritation that we may feel over lack of acknowledgement of significant improvements which have been made in recent years and acknowledge the existence of areas where further progress can be made.

A defensive response, in which universities merely state that more money is required to enable us to do more of the same and better, offers no prospect of committed Government support.

None of this means that we should sell ourselves short. Indeed it is a time to reassert core values and to get on with the business of defining our own future. In the case of the University of Sydney, this means a commitment to the highest quality as measured by international standards and it means also taking pride in being a public institution.

Let me say more about both of these fundamentals. There is a great deal of talk about Australia aspiring to have one or two universities in the world's top rank of 50. This is a useful simplistic slogan to make the current review more vivid and pressing for those who might otherwise remain disengaged. It does not, of course, imply sweetheart funding for some capriciously anointed duo. It does not even presuppose a belief in some contestable process for linear rankings of entire universities. What I like to believe it suggests is unlimited ambition for unashamed areas of excellence throughout Australian universities. We cannot aspire to world-class leadership across all disciplines within a bus ride of every Australian home ­ yet there are commentators who claim that any lesser aspiration is to deny equity of access. To be afraid to design a system within which some may soar is to guarantee mediocrity for all. We must be unafraid of pockets of excellence and the natural consequence could well be that some institutions, in the large, emerge as truly distinguished on the world stage.

There is a sour comment going the rounds in America today to the effect that state universities were once state funded, are now state supported and will soon be state located. We can argue that Commonwealth operating grant nowadays contributes only some 30 per cent to our current budget and that State Government support is negligible. It is necessary to seek new sources of income and we would be silly to reject additional funds which can be applied to our core objectives. We must never forget, however, that we exist to provide opportunity for those who can benefit from our programs, independent of their personal means, and that our basic goals of achieving excellence in teaching and research are dedicated to the needs of the people we serve.

I firmly believe that the best way to contribute to a national review is to continue a process of self-review directed to an uncompromising pursuit of quality as a leading public university.