As every good Victorian over the age of 35 knows, furniture salesman Franco Cozzo was the unofficial cult king of Footscray in the 1990s, but after last year’s financial result at VU, Vice-Chancellor Adam Shoemaker may be forced to take on the crown.
The university recorded a thumping $66.1 million surplus last year, with enrolments topping 49,000 and ongoing demand for the University’s now-bustling vertical city campus.
When Professor Shoemaker took the helm at VU in 2020, he inherited the block model, but also an institution beset with issues; 28,585 students, a brand that was on the nose, a teaching model beloved by pedagogical specialists and few others and a threadbare profit margin.
While managing to almost double enrolments since then, VU has maintained a strong focus on equity, with 35% of students in HE and 51% in VU’s TAFE programs coming from the Accord’s equity categories (Indigenous, rural, low SES and students with a disability) – while achieving a success rate of 92.1% in HE.
“The 42.2% of our higher education students are first in family and their success rate is 93.4%, which is one of the statistics that we are most proud of,” Professor Shoemaker said.
“The Accord didn’t identify first in family as an equity cohort, but we think it’s really important. For the first time these students are breaking into a field that no one in their recent family history has done before.
“This result is a great tribute to the 3,500 staff and almost 50,000 students that achieved these outcomes. Now we have to maintain and extend those gains, and grow so that the promise of higher education can be delivered to many more people.”
With the return of the Albanese government, it was important to make the most of continuity in Government education policy to progress reforms that will support equity and excellence into the future, Professor Shoemaker said.
“The return of the same Ministers to the sector is an opportunity to realise the agenda of the Accord. It is a recognition of the knowledge that has been acquired, and an opportunity to get it done,” he said.
“We have had three elections in three weeks – in Canada, Australia and the papacy and in each you can see a return to values-led leadership, and a recognition of the value of education. I’m very optimistic.
“I have never worked at a place before where people who you meet in the community say I love the model of the teaching. When we are doing job interviews, people say they want to work at VU because of the values. It’s pretty encouraging.”
