National Party of Australia

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In 2007 CAPA had a short list of key priorities for the federal election^[1]. Below is a quick recap of the campai

A report card on the higher education policies of the Coalition and Labor parties released by university staff and students on Tuesday has failed the Howard Government for its record on universities.

The report card, prepared by National Tertiary Education Union, the National Union of Students and the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations, awarded Labor a pass on the basis of the well targeted but limited commitments announced during the campaign and its stated commitment to build on these in office.

A report card on the higher education policies of the Coalition and Labor parties released by university staff and students on Tuesday has failed the Howard Government for its record on universities.

The report card, prepared by National Tertiary Education Union, the National Union of Students and the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations, awarded Labor a pass on the basis of the well targeted but limited commitments announced during the campaign and its stated commitment to build on these in office.

A new report by the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA) has established that, one year after implementation, voluntary student unionism (VSU) has resulted in a critical diminution of service delivery and significant loss of staff and representative capacity in postgraduate student organisations across university campuses.

CAPA's 2007 election priorities are as follows:

• Secure support for independent student representation and services
• Income support reform for research and coursework postgraduate students
• Increased funding for HDR scholarships

The Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA) welcomes announcements in the 2007-2008 Federal Budget that recognise some targeted areas of student need, particularly in the case of postgraduates, and hopes that these set the foundation for improvements in access to student income support and broader equity measures in the future.

"We welcome the will on the part of the Federal Government to at least recognise that there are in fact areas of genuine student need, and take steps to begin to address them" CAPA President, Nigel Palmer said.

On the 15th of November 2006, the Minister for Education, Science and Training announced that the RQF would go ahead. The Minister also endorsed the RQF model recommended by the Development Advisory Group (DAG). Below is a summary of key recommendations from the approved model. Included also are some conclusions on what this might mean for postgraduate students.

For further detailed discussion and background on issues pertaining to the RQF, please refer to the CAPA submissions and briefings.

The complete briefing paper is available in the PDF below:

CAPA welcomes the small specifically targeted funding allocation for research within this year's Budget. However, this funding in no way makes up for the decade of neglect of the entire higher education sector over which the Howard government has presided.

CAPA believes that the Federal government must invest substantial sums in the sector in order to reverse the damage caused by policy failures which have seen universities starved of funding for years.

This briefing paper provides a background to the RQF, outlines the stages in the development process, and highlights particular issues for postgraduates. For a comprehensive discussion of the issues, please refer to the CAPA submissions:

- Research Quality Framework: Response to the Issues Paper (May 2005)
- Response to the Research Quality Framework Preferred Model (Oct 2005)

These are available on the CAPA website

The DEST RQF website:
http://www.dest.gov.au/sectors/research_sector/policies_issues_reviews/key_iss
ues/research_quality_framework/default.htm