ATEC explained at last. Puzzled how it will work with three statutory commissioners and everybody else Department of Education staff? So was Liberal senator Maria Kovavic who asked DoE head Tony Cook in Senate Estimates who would do what.
“Senator Kokavic: You are saying it's a complete carve-out of processes outside of the department into ATEC, which means, in your view, there should be no duplication whatsoever. It's taken outside of the department, in a sense, but it's still accountable to the department.
Mr Cook: But still inside the department.
Senator Kokavic: Outside but inside.
Mr Cook: That’s exactly it.”
This is going to be a continuing bureaucratic brawl of the WestWing meets Game of Thrones kind. FC will be watching from Episode One.
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The UTS branch of the National Tertiary Education Union announces a successful vote of Pyongyang proportions. The comrades put a motion of no-confidence in Vice Chancellor Andrew Parfitt to an all-staff vote, which was agreed by 95 per cent of the 1500 poll, total UTS headcount is around 5000. “The Vice-Chancellor has lost the mandate to lead,” branch president Sarah Attfield said.
The ballot was ahead of today’s scheduled final Senate committee report on higher education provider governance.
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Deborah Terry becomes chair of the Group of Eight. The Uni Queensland VC replaces Mark Scott (Uni Sydney). On any measure of acuity and achievement Professor Terry is the nation’s ranking Vice-Chancellor. As per her previous term at Curtin U she has stuck to her day job consolidating UoQ’s research reputation and its standing as the state’s premier teaching university. Stuff-ups are rare on her watch. With Chancellor Peter Varghese she succeeded where other Go8 leaderships failed during the Gaza disputes, permitting protests but keeping the peace on campus.
Whatever her intent in now taking on a national role, her skills and style are needed. The Group of Eight are generally the universities that attract community ire over international enrolments, staff payment problems and perceived arrogance. When critics suggest universities have lost their social licence they mean the Eight. Deborah Terry is the woman to make the case for reissuing it.
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In a sequel to Fee-Free TAFE there is another Federal Government giveaway in training – a million “fully subsidised” places in a NSW TAFE online micro-skill course, “Introduction to Artificial Intelligence.” It is self-paced, online and takes two-and-a-half hours. List price is $140, but it is free for four months. Participants will learn about “real-world applications, AI terminology, starting a career in the tech and its “challenges, risks and benefits.” Here’s hoping the Feds are getting a hefty discount – 1m x $140 is quite a splash of cash.
Want to learn how to write a prompt so you can actually use AI? Tough luck – it isn’t mentioned.
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The Australian Research Council “acknowledges continued interest” in its competitive grants program review. This is a less understated, than a subterranean reference, to a proposal to transform the existing system, first floated in February. The plan is to replace the existing National Competitive Grants Program (think Discovery and Linkage headline grants) with six new schemes which all support pure basic, strategic basic and applied research. It was delayed in July after largely ECR uproar over what some fear will be reduced independence for their work. And there is still no word on when it will be in place with the ARC announcing the government is still thinking. But the council appears to be preparing for something to change. Last week it quietly proposed spilling 21 generally senior positions and filling 16 new ones, “to ensure we have the right people at the right level to support early-stage research to the benefit of all Australians.”
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In June, the National Health and Medical Research Council announced it was bringing the not entirely admired SAPPHIRE grant admin system in-house. The reason was to reduce administrative burden, optimise data capability and build an innovation culture – just not yet, The transfer was scheduled for mid 2027. This is now postponed to never. The Council now commits to “align with the Australian Government’s direction toward a common technology approach for grants management across agencies.” So, SAPPHIRE stays while, “ we work towards a modern, streamlined grants management solution.” It was a blue (sorry) from the start, launching in 2019 at a cost of $16.2m, nearly three times the original budget.
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UAC announces pre-ATAR Y12 First Preferences for NSW and ACT universities. These always bounce around a bit, what with the way universities have clipped preference credibility with early entry schemes. Still, year on year, they are an indication of which institutions rate. And as ever, the two that do are the old rivals Uni Sydney (2026: 24.35%; 2025:22.58%; 2024: 21.07%) and UNSW (2026: 22.58%; 2025: 21.37%; 2024:21.26%).
Third of the big three, UTS, is down for next year (15.01%) on this (16.87%).
As for ANU, if the successful union-led campaign to remove Genevieve Bell has any impact on 18 year-olds, it does not show in the insignificant share of preferences, 2.86% for next year and this; both up on 2.21% for 2024.
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For-profit journal giant Wiley reports a good US Q2 result for research, up 6% to US$279m. There was a 28% increase in article submissions and a 12% rise in “output,” especially in author-paid OA – so it is the old business model, where institutions pay fees to read or publish that makes the money. AI revenue was $5m.