ALP to abolish full-fee places (1 Viewer)

[Not-That-Bright]

The degree would certainly not be regarded as highly and your marks do not mean as much because you competed against less able students to obtain them. Regardless of whether or not lower UAI students do well in uni, there will be the perception that the marks from a course with a large proportion of under achievers have lesser worth than those from a course with a lower percentage of 'back-door' entrants.

Ar ok. Then I do agree with you, I do think it makes the degree seem less prestigious to have too many fee-based places. At the same time I think the degree would still be of the same quality if it was outcomes based.

 

[hiphophooray123]

who gives a fuck they aren't going to get elected anyway because they suck.

 

[Mambomeg]

I'm so divided on the fee paying issue. I dont believe people should be able to buy their way into a place at uni, and i think we as a country should stay well away from the American style of college education where parents have to start college fund for their kids before they are even born.

However, in my degree especially, i see the need for extra funding to help fund the running of the university and augment the government funding for HECS students.

Since starting uni i have met so many people who just missed out on places and who took the fee paying option, shouldering debts of $150,000 for my degree, when they missed out by only 1 or 2 UAI points. Many of these people will make such better vets than some of the people with HECS places who got UAI's in the high 90's.

Obviously the UAI system is the best system we have for fair university admissions, but UAI does not reflect a persons aptitude for specific degrees. For some degrees, Vet and Medicine in particular, interviews should be compulsory, so that worthy people a few marks below the cut off dont miss out to people who may be technically "smarter" but have no social skills or empathy.

The Fee help system (for those fee paying students who are paying their own way) doesnt even cover the first 2 years of the Vet degree. So the only possible way for a student to do Fee paying Vet is if their family has money (or they win the lottery etc). Its not fair if two students who both got UAI's just below the cut off, for one of them to get a place just because their parents have money. They are both equally deserving, both missed out, and both should have to transfer in the same manner. It is an inherantly unfair system.

But I need fee paying students to fund my education. Kind of sucks really.

 

[Rafy]

There's also Fee-help, which allows you to take out up to a $50,000 non-interest loan from the government to assist you in paying off your universities fees while you study.

For the record, Fee-help was increased to $80 000 (from 50k) in the last federal budget. (and $100,000 for medicine, dentistry and veterinary science.)

 

[Xayma]

I'm so divided on the fee paying issue. I dont believe people should be able to buy their way into a place at uni, and i think we as a country should stay well away from the American style of college education where parents have to start college fund for their kids before they are even born.

However, in my degree especially, i see the need for extra funding to help fund the running of the university and augment the government funding for HECS students.

Since starting uni i have met so many people who just missed out on places and who took the fee paying option, shouldering debts of $150,000 for my degree, when they missed out by only 1 or 2 UAI points. Many of these people will make such better vets than some of the people with HECS places who got UAI's in the high 90's.

Obviously the UAI system is the best system we have for fair university admissions, but UAI does not reflect a persons aptitude for specific degrees. For some degrees, Vet and Medicine in particular, interviews should be compulsory, so that worthy people a few marks below the cut off dont miss out to people who may be technically "smarter" but have no social skills or empathy.

The Fee help system (for those fee paying students who are paying their own way) doesnt even cover the first 2 years of the Vet degree. So the only possible way for a student to do Fee paying Vet is if their family has money (or they win the lottery etc). Its not fair if two students who both got UAI's just below the cut off, for one of them to get a place just because their parents have money. They are both equally deserving, both missed out, and both should have to transfer in the same manner. It is an inherantly unfair system.

But I need fee paying students to fund my education. Kind of sucks really.

I agree that if full fee places exist that there should be enough available in loans to pay it back. Probably with the added condition that it is payable even if you don't pay Australian taxes, such that one cannot leave a $100 000 debt behind.

Also American universities aren't as expensive as they are made out to be, you can get it quite cheap in state university systems, the culture around the university of going out of state or to private universities makes it. For example the cost of tuition at the University of Washington for residents of that state is only $US 5610 (about $AU 7500) a year, this jumps to $US 19 907 ($AU 26 000) if you are not a resident of Washington.

 

[c_james]

I thought a great idea would be to raise the band arts degrees are in to economics and business degrees, get rid of the chaff from uni.

The implication here being that everyone doing an Arts degree is 'chaff'. I'm doing a BA. Am I chaff? Why is someone doing a run of the mill Commerce degree, which is just as, if not more widespread than Arts nowadays, not chaff? I guess what I'm trying to say is that your comment was a pretty baseless generalisation.

I support fee-paying places. They certainly don't give rich people a 'free ride' in tertiary education - I agree totally with the FEE-HELP argument; most fee-payers, from my personal experience with them anyway, are taking on a ridiculous amount of jobs and are deferring most of the payments. They're hardworking kids, a lot of whom fell short of arbitrary cutoffs by mere increments of 0.05 or 0.10. Superficially the system does look unfair, but, as always, Labor is critiquing the system in its theory, not its practice.

 

[sarevok]

Stupid to expect a completely equitable education system. Full-fee places are morally questionable IMO, but at the same time it is morally questionable that some parents are able to fork out thousands to send their kids to top private schools at which they receive a better standard of education than those students in public schools. However, the education system is still at least reasonably meritocratic: as much as it can be, I think, given economic realities

btw, does anyone have any stats for the % of students who are full-fee in particular courses? i would be interested to know the % of students in law who are full-fee, much higher than the 3% overall cited in the article i'm guessing...

 

[turtleface]

In this CSP vs Fee debate, many of you forget that the ENTER/UAI required to get into a course for CSP is dictated by market forces. Any people who can't don't take the place of those who can. Its not a case of deserving to get in or not, its more of a case of whether people who can afford to pay for a fee paying place, should be allowed to access a secondary market where there is pretty much unlimited supply of places. The term "buying your way in" is inaccurate, as you aren't taking anyone else's spot.

As people have said, the government's FEE-Help system allows poor people to access the Full Fee place market, provided they get into a degree that will pay a high salary (e.g. Commerce, Engineering, some health sciences, etc.)

btw, does anyone have any stats for the % of students who are full-fee in particular courses? i would be interested to know the % of students in law who are full-fee, much higher than the 3% overall cited in the article i'm guessing...

In Melbourne, the Fee paying proportion of Law is 95%, however this figure is distorted by the dual fee type degree system. In reality, its close to about 1/3.

Frankly I think the status quo works, as long as its not an excuse for the government to let the numbers of CSP places stagnate.

 

[withoutaface]

...but you are quite happy to call someone a homosexual as an insult. It's a bit of a personal internal contradiction. So I guess that makes you closentedly PC. Non PC on the outside but really PC on the inside, not to mention a complete juvenile. Last time I heard someone seriously call someone a faggot for taking offence at something was back in high school. Grow up.

It's like being against the White Australia policy but then calling someone a racially derogatory name to insult. Oh oh no! But I'm not a racist. I have a whole bunch of racially diverse people I know who I really love! But in the mean time I'll call use racially charged insults to illustrate my argument.

In any case I prefer the Australian Oxford dictionary.

Faggot
1. Bundle of Sticks
2. colloquial. offensive. male homosexual.

Wiki

Faggot or fag, in modern American English, Canadian English and Australian English usage, is a generally pejorative term for a gay or effeminate man. Its use has spread to varying extents elsewhere in the English-speaking world.

Faggot is a word that it's primary use by people our age has nothing to do with homosexuals, and I was using it in that manner. Racially derisive terms tend not to have the same generic meaning for a person who's a douchebag, and as such they're not used in that capacity. So if I were to call someone a tool, you'd of course take the literal interpretation and shout at me for dehumanising them by suggesting they're a mechanical instrument used in the construction/maintenance of machinery?

EDIT: Actually if you must know I've dated a bisexual woman in the past (who turned out to be lesbian, but besides the point), and she called me a fag as a running joke because my hair was long. Does this make her a homophobe?

EDITEDIT: Or my bisexual mate (who's only fucked guys) who does something similar. Is he a homophobe?

 

[c_james]

I meant individuals who do arts because they don't want to do anything else. Instead of having them drop out in the first year, the degrees are left to people who actually want to do them - it's no longer a really cheap degree to bum around in. This creates an economic disincentive to enrol in an arts degree that you aren't intending to use, and creates a greater economic incentive to enrol in education degrees.

I think all university students are chaff, and places should be free. But I think that every uni in NSW other than UTS, USYD, MACQ, and UNSW should be shut down.

I understand what you're saying, but it's erroneous to assume that only Arts students do this - I know of more directionless Commerce students than I do Arts students. If you're going to increase the prices of Arts units, you should do the same for Commerce/Economics units by your logic.

 

[takehomecopy]

I understand what you're saying, but it's erroneous to assume that only Arts students do this - I know of more directionless Commerce students than I do Arts students. If you're going to increase the prices of Arts units, you should do the same for Commerce/Economics units by your logic.

I know more directionless arts students than commerce students. It's not that the commerce students aren't directionless. Many I know know what they want, they are just emotionally and psychologically lost, apathetic and bored by their very existence.

 

[Not-That-Bright]

I'm somwhat jealous of people doing arts. I was going to do arts at sydney because quite a few of the philosophy units appealed to me, there's even a cross-study unit you can do that's also a part of theology which is about the existance of god, something you'd know from the other thread I'm quite interested in. Just my slightly off topic rant.

 

[Captain Gh3y]

I think all university students are chaff, and places should be free. But I think that every uni in NSW other than UTS, USYD, MACQ, and UNSW should be shut down.

But then all the bogans from here would go down there and vastly lower the prestige and learning environment of your unis. You're better off keeping them away with mickey mouse universities, trust me.

 

[Not-That-Bright]

But then all the bogans from here would go down there and vastly lower the prestige and learning environment of your unis.

Almost all of my friends went into the city for uni, they all still live out near me in penrith. Most of them went to UTS. On the other hand, I know alot of people that go to UWS that come from places much closer to the city... I think the main discriminating factor is UAI, not location

 

[c_james]

Many I know know what they want, they are just emotionally and psychologically lost, apathetic and bored by their very existence.

That's called directionless, I'm afraid.

 

[Rafy]

Labor's Higher education white paper:
http://alp.org.au/download/now/0607...sities___building_our_future_in_the_world.pdf

 

[withoutaface]

I know more directionless arts students than commerce students. It's not that the commerce students aren't directionless. Many I know know what they want, they are just emotionally and psychologically lost, apathetic and bored by their very existence.

Not going to respond to my questions?

 

[bustinjustin]

Personal feelings aside, I don't see too much wrong with fee-paying students given the dire financial circumstances of our public universities, thus Labor's move is somewhat uncalled for. Claims of injustice and academic inferiority take care of themselves since fee-payers compete on equal level fields despite the unequal means of entry.

It's when this equal level playing field is compromised and distorted according to each team's (HECS/CSP vs fee-payers) financial contributions, which is exactly what's happening at Sydney Uni, particularly in the Economics Faculty.

Recently the Dean has proposed a new funding system whereby funding is essentially based on the number of fee-paying students a department attracts. So if a fee-paying student chooses Accounting over, say, Political Economy, then Accounting will receive the extra funds this fee-payer contributes in comparison to a CSP student. Consequently, departments with higher proportions of CSP students will receive less funding under this new system as their students contribute less to the Faculty's budget than the financially endowed students of other often 'business-y' departments. As a result, if there are few fee-payers in their department/s, CSP students will suffer because of their inability to pay. The new system defeats the University's mantra that all students benefit from fee-payers on the premise that the extra funds from fee-payers will be allocated according to departmental need rather than the subects fee-payers choose.

 

[littlewing69]

On the one hand, I'm a remorseless egalitarian and I detest the hereditary wealth that fee-paying places can result in. On the other, these rich kiddies are gonna be paying me through Law, effectively, and there would no doubt be fewer HECS places and thus chance of me getting in if there were no fee-payers.

However, the advantage should not be 5 UAI points across the spectrum. Perhaps above 90 fee-payers should only get 3 extra points? 2?

 

[Not-That-Bright]

Perhaps above 90 fee-payers should only get 3 extra points? 2?

It often isn't 5, but reguardless what does it matter if they all meet the same performance requirements in the end to get the degree? If a student with a much lower uai can attend the same course as those with higher ones and do just as well... then I say the system needs some fixing