WEAll Australia
I’m sure many of you will have read David Graeber’s recent article in the New York Review of Books, called “Against Economics”. He opens with the statement that “There is a growing feeling, among those who have the responsibility of managing large economies, that the discipline of economics is no longer fit for purpose.”
For anyone with an interest in the higher education system today, the anxiety is palpable.
The ‘Job-Ready Graduates’ package has passed the Senate while universities, instead of speaking out, seemed content to bargain with the government and trade off affordable higher education for negligible promises of extra student places or any degree of funding certainty. The bill would see a decrease in government funding per student place, a 113% hike in the price of most Arts degrees, and students who fail first-year subjects cut off from government-subsidised fees and HELP loans.
Introduction Education in Australia is guided by a national curriculum and has three cross-curriculum priorities, one of which is sustainability. These priorities are supposed to pervade all aspects of learning in school, rather than being confined to a single subject or topic. Because sustainability encompasses
Australian Education Minister Dan Tehan recently announced changes to tertiary education funding intended to incentivise study for ‘jobs of the future’. As reported by the ABC‘s Conor Duffy, ‘job relevant’ Australian University course fees are to be slashed: Subjects in nursing, psychology, English, languages, teaching,
What’s wrong with economics? Many people seem to be wondering. A subject claimed by its practitioners as the ‘queen of the social sciences’ is widely seen as partly culpable for the contemporary problems of financial crisis, excessive debt, unsustainable growth, ecological stresses and deepening social inequalities. Perhaps the roots of this issue lie in economics education.