Southern Cross University has had a highly successful pathway program and around 300 credit recognition arrangements in place for years, so it was quite the surprise this week to see Education Minister Jason Clare announcing, "Southern Cross is the latest university to offer quicker and cheaper degrees by offering up to a full year off a degree for TAFE students."
While admissions officers who have been labouring over credit transfers for decades, dual sector unis and most regionals gnash their teeth in the background, the Minister announces that Southern Cross has followed the University of Canberra and Western Sydney, "as a pace setter here."
So how is it that multiple press releases are going out heralding something that has already been going on for decades (albeit not particularly well on many occasions)?
Future Campus got on the blower to Southern Cross VC Tyrone Carlin yesterday to try to understand why what was old is suddenly new again and to be fair, he did a good job of explaining the situation.
Professor Carlin explained that while Southern Cross has had hundreds of credit recognition arrangements in place for years, under its new approach, grads with one of 20 nationally-recognised TAFE diplomas will be guaranteed a place in one of 8 degrees at the University, and they will also be guaranteed a full year of credit.
While credit transfer is not new, allowing a student with a TAFE qualification to access university, the way it is being offered is new for Southern Cross – and, importantly, should make life easier for students.
"We have done the work with the faculties in advance; we don't need to refer individual applications back to them so they can review their credit positions, so we are able to say if you have one of the 20 nationally-recognised diplomas we will guarantee you a place and you will get one year's credit," Professor Carlin said.
"We are trying to take the idea that has already been there and really crisp it up, from a prospective student point of view, so they know exactly where they stand."
So does the touted savings of up to $17,000 for students who do a Free TAFE diploma and head straight into second year mean that first year intakes will slump, or disappear altogether? How will universities demonstrate that it is worth $17,000 to choose uni over TAFE, beyond the chance for a few discounted beers at an O-Week barbeque on campus?
Professor Carlin believes a strong market for university traditionalists will remain.
"I am really confident that irrespective of what we do with harmonisation, there will be heaps of people who want to go to uni and do it all the way through; but some will start in TAFE knowing they can go to the other part of the system (universities) later if they want to.," he said.
The new approach doesn't reinvent credit recognition, but it could save considerable time for the admissions team, reduce faculty load as they don't have to review individual applications from students with those diplomas, and improve clarity and speed of acceptance for students – which are all valuable outcomes internally and for students.
With that cleared up, back at Education HQ, Mr Clare is signalling that more press releases could be on the way, as the Federal Government awaits a national credit recognition framework from ATEC and holds a giant orange cash carrot in front of the noses of VCs.
"To encourage more universities and TAFEs to work together, the ATEC will be able to allocate more future student places to universities that offer these sorts of credit for TAFE qualifications," Mr Clare said.
Presumably the individual compacts under negotiation will mean that the ATEC recognises all universities already offering access to TAFE grads, even if the press releases don't?