Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios

The Rudd Government has outlined a goal that by 2025, 40 per cent of Australians aged 25 to 34 should hold a Bachelor 's level qualification and that, by 2020, around 20 per cent of undergraduate enrolments at Australian universities should be filled by students from low socio- economic-status...

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Main Authors: Phillimore, John, Koshy, Paul
Format: Journal Article
Published: Centre for Population and Urban Research, Monash University 2010
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/13846
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author Phillimore, John
Koshy, Paul
author_facet Phillimore, John
Koshy, Paul
author_sort Phillimore, John
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description The Rudd Government has outlined a goal that by 2025, 40 per cent of Australians aged 25 to 34 should hold a Bachelor 's level qualification and that, by 2020, around 20 per cent of undergraduate enrolments at Australian universities should be filled by students from low socio- economic-status (SES) backgrounds. The current level of low SES participation is 16.3 per cent, with substantial diversity in outcomes between institutional groupings and states and territories. This paper considers three policy options for raising national participation levels of students from low SES backgrounds: (i) uniform increases across all institutions to meet the 20 per cent national target; (ii) differential increases in indirect proportion to current levels of low SES participation by institutions; and (iii) differential increases proportional to the share of the low SES population located within each state and territory. The authors find that a national approach to achieving the 20 per cent target needs to consider both current enrolment patterns across institutional groupings as well as differences in the low SES population across the states and territories. Students' SES is currently determined by their postcode. The authors argue that this is unsatisfactory and that better measures must be developed before targets can be set for individual institutions.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-138462017-01-30T11:39:52Z Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios Phillimore, John Koshy, Paul The Rudd Government has outlined a goal that by 2025, 40 per cent of Australians aged 25 to 34 should hold a Bachelor 's level qualification and that, by 2020, around 20 per cent of undergraduate enrolments at Australian universities should be filled by students from low socio- economic-status (SES) backgrounds. The current level of low SES participation is 16.3 per cent, with substantial diversity in outcomes between institutional groupings and states and territories. This paper considers three policy options for raising national participation levels of students from low SES backgrounds: (i) uniform increases across all institutions to meet the 20 per cent national target; (ii) differential increases in indirect proportion to current levels of low SES participation by institutions; and (iii) differential increases proportional to the share of the low SES population located within each state and territory. The authors find that a national approach to achieving the 20 per cent target needs to consider both current enrolment patterns across institutional groupings as well as differences in the low SES population across the states and territories. Students' SES is currently determined by their postcode. The authors argue that this is unsatisfactory and that better measures must be developed before targets can be set for individual institutions. 2010 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/13846 Centre for Population and Urban Research, Monash University fulltext
spellingShingle Phillimore, John
Koshy, Paul
Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
title Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
title_full Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
title_fullStr Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
title_full_unstemmed Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
title_short Meeting the Rudd Government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
title_sort meeting the rudd government's equity targets for universities: three scenarios
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/13846