AUSTRALIAN Catholic University’s (ACU) vice-chancellor is backing changes to tertiary education which could result in higher student fees, but students say fees are already high enough.
Professor Peter Sheehan said that as a member of the Australian Vice-Chancellors Committee (AVCC) he supported the proposed framework which comprised multiple options and choices for universities.
‘I would not like to pull back from the fees issue but the problem for ACU would be if we came in on fee income we would need to balance it with our mission obligations.
‘We would have to make some kind of mission related decision such as scholarships for disadvantaged students to operate in parallel.’
Prof Sheehan said at the moment there was a gap between the cost of delivering good education outcomes and the funds flowing into the system.
But Griffith University student and Catholic, Elizabeth Blinco, said tertiary institutions should look at where they were spending their funds if they couldn’t make ends meet.
‘It’s certainly not going on the students. We pay for everything and some things we pay double what you would off campus so I think they should have a close look at their own spending to see where the money is going.’
