Non‐traditional students in Australian higher education: Persistent inequities and the new ideology of ‘student choice’

Abstract

Despite the expansion of access to Australian higher education in the past decade, the participation shares of rural and isolated people and people from lower socio‐economic backgrounds have altered little and remain unacceptably low. This paper reports findings from two national studies at the Centre for the Study of Higher Education that have examined student choices about higher education, especially the inhibiting factors still present for non‐traditional students. The discussion focuses on the dilemmas and challenges for Australian universities in balancing the adoption of entrepreneurial approaches to student recruitment with an unfinished equity agenda. The paper raises questions about the new ideology of individual choice influencing university policy and whether or not this can be reconciled with social equity objectives.     

The impact of institutional culture,policy and process on student engagement in university decision-making

There is a strong focus on the importance of student engagement in higher education, with increasing attention on how students can participate in their university’s decision-making processes. Yet, although the concept appears to be almost universally accepted, it is rarely problematised. This has led some commentators to conclude that student engagement lacks theoretical clarity. Consequently, an increasing number of authors have sought to address this. This paper adds to those efforts by proposing a model for student engagement that recognises the importance of institutional action in facilitating different types of participation. These are aligned with expectations for student activity, but the key message is that the university shapes its students’ engagement. This reinforces arguments that engagement needs to be cognisant of the power dynamics of higher education. In line with this, the paper borrows from debates around public participation to enhance understanding of student engagement in institutional governance.     

Constructing an academic identity in Australia: an autoethnographic narrative

This paper examines the process of academic identity construction experienced by a Chinese PhD student in an Australian university from 2010 to 2014. The researcher draws on his diaries written in Australia and uses some stories of the relationships with his supervisors and other scholars to unfold the process of his academic identity construction in a host academic community. Two years on, the researcher reflects on the challenges confronted during his candidature, exploring the Australian PhD education system from within. This study will help educators and supervisors to understand an international higher degree research student’s gradual academic identity construction as a cultural Other in the context of globalized higher education systems, and it will contribute to the mutual understanding between supervisors and international research students, as well as supervisors’ professional supervision in a globalized higher education context.     

The attainability of university degrees and their labour market benefits for young Australians

I used data from the 1995 cohort of the Longitudinal Surveys of Australian Youth to investigate the factors associated with the attainment of Australian university degrees and estimate their domestic labour market benefits. I considered vertical and horizontal stratification in education and examined monetary and non-monetary benefits. The probabilities of attaining a university degree differed significantly by individual and family background. Individual’s family backgrounds significantly predicted the prestige of their universities, but not their fields of study. University graduates enjoyed higher income and occupational prestige relative to non-graduates. Among university graduates, income and occupational benefits differed significantly by fields of study but less by the prestige of universities. These findings indicate that vertical stratification in education plays an important role in the intergenerational transmission of social status in Australia. My findings suggest that policies should ensure equal access to higher education for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. Strategies to reduce inequality in higher education are discussed.     

Prioritizing the education of marginalized young people in Brazil: a collaborative approach

This paper explores constructions of the ‘new’ university student in the context of UK government policy to widen participation in higher education. New Labour discourse stresses the benefits of widening participation for both individuals and society, although increasing the levels of participation of students from groups who have not traditionally entered university has been accompanied by a discourse of ‘dumbing down’ and lowering standards. The paper draws on an ongoing longitudinal study of undergraduate students in a post–1992 inner‐city university in the UK to examine students' constructions of their experiences and identities in the context of public discourses of the ‘new’ higher education student. Many of the participants in this study would be regarded as ‘non‐traditional’ students, i.e. those students who are the focus of widening participation policy initiatives. As Reay et al. (2002) discovered, for many ‘non‐traditional’ students studying in higher education is characterized by ‘struggle’, something that also emerged as an important theme in this research. The paper examines the ways in which these new student identities both echo the New Labour dream of widening participation and yet continue to reflect and re‐construct classed and other identities and inequalities.     

‘You're not just learning it,you're living it!’ Constructing the ‘good life’ in Australian university online promotional videos

Online promotional videos on Australian university websites are a form of institutional branding and marketing that construct university experience in a variety of ways. Here we consider how these multimedia texts represent student lifestyles, identities and aspirations in terms of the ‘good life’. We consider how the ‘promise of happiness’ is deployed to appeal to perceived consumer desires within the local student market, as well as within the highly competitive global knowledge economy. These texts position university students as youthful, attractive, active and fun, and depict student life as being about leisure and pleasure. Such representations promote cultural and social entitlement to the ‘good life’ as if synonymous with choice, participation and success in higher education. Learning and scholarship are depicted as secondary activities. We also contend that claims to cosmopolitanism and consumerism are framed by racialised entitlements where Whiteness remains both a commodity and norm.     

Teaching social work students against the grain: negotiating the constraints and possibilities

Students who have followed routes to Western universities other than the ‘traditional’ one – that is, an uninterrupted path from school to university – face greater challenges to their democratic participation in higher education than their ‘traditional’ counterparts. Until recently, universities have predominantly expected students with diverse entry points to assimilate into existing curricula and academic modes of operating. Such expectation, when combined with reductionist managerial accountability, has largely marginalised non-traditional students. This paper reports on a project which aimed to reverse this marginalisation in an Australian Bachelor of Social Work degree. It is argued that students from diverse linguistic, cultural and educational backgrounds, having greater challenges in negotiating privileged academic and discipline literacies, are better served pedagogically by curriculum design that resonates with their lifeworlds and makes tacit assumptions in university literacies explicit. Using practitioner action research in a partnership between a social work and an academic language and learning academic, pedagogies that utilised students’ literacy practices as assets for learning were enacted over two research cycles. The possibilities and constraints that emerged to support student learning and more equitable participation were examined. The findings suggest that it is possible, even under current preoccupations with measurements and budget constraints, to signal key points of negotiation for pedagogic change to respond more inclusively and equitably to contemporary university students.     

Tactics or strategies? Exploring everyday conditions to facilitate implementation of an Indigenous graduate attributes project

In 2017 Universities Australia (UA), the peak body representing Australian universities released its Indigenous Strategy 2017–2020. The document unites universities together in common goals for Indigenous achievement, filling a notable gap in the Australian higher education landscape. The Strategy outlines a comprehensive plan for enhanced Indigenous outcomes in critical areas of higher education including student access and success, graduate research, and community engagement. This paper focuses on the implementation of Indigenous curriculum for all Australian university graduates which is a key aspect of the Strategy. The changing Indigenous higher education landscape invites the nuanced analysis that critical examination of universities, as organisations, might elicit. Drawing on de Certeau’s notion of tactics and strategies, the paper examines the policy and cultural climate of an Australian university which supports an Indigenous Graduate Attribute curriculum project.     

Being ‘religious and cultural rebels’ or being ‘cultural hybrids’? The role of identity capital in Muslim female university students’ self-construction

ABSTRACT

Research on university-educated Muslim women in different cultural contexts has displayed an intricate and paradoxical connection between experiences of higher education and identity mediation. A traditional model conceptualizes Muslim female university students as ‘rebels’ against their heritage religion and culture. Recent developments in the context of poststructural feminism highlight the configuration of a hybrid self-image embracing the target and heritage cultures in an additive and empowering manner. To enhance our understanding of the potential impact of higher education on identity negotiation, this study employs the notion of identity capital in an analysis of two South Asian Muslim female university students in Hong Kong over a two-year period. Participants’ life histories reveal that personal capacity to invest in identity capital (a contextually-dependent hybrid self) relies on an individual’s unique possession of various forms of capital. This study thus cautions against generalizations about Muslim women’s university experiences, and suggests that Muslim minorities as multicultural students and that their multilingual/multicultural skills, as forms of ‘intercultural capital,’ should be valued by all societal institutions.     

(Re)Producing Mathematics Educators: A sociological perspective

Whilst participation in higher education has increased dramatically over the last two decades, many universities are only now beginning to pay more attention to the learning experiences of first year students. It is important for universities to understand how first year students conceive of learning and knowing in order to promote effective approaches to learning. Even though an extensive body of research demonstrates that beliefs about learning and knowing influence student approaches to learning and learning outcomes, there has been no Australian research that has investigated this critical learner characteristic across first year university students. This paper reports on preliminary data from an ongoing longitudinal study designed to investigate first year students’ beliefs about knowing and learning (epistemological beliefs). Students from teacher education and creative industry faculties in two Australian universities completed the Epistemological Beliefs Survey (EBS) in the first week of their first semester of study. A series of one‐way ANOVA using key demographics as independent variables and the EBS factor scores as dependent variables showed that epistemological beliefs were related to the course of study, previous post‐school education experience, family experience at university, gender, and age. These data help us to understand students’ beliefs about learning and knowing with a view to informing effective learning in higher education.     

From Design and Implementation to Impact of Quality Assurance: An Overview of Some Studies into what Impacts Improvement

Abstract

Access to university has improved following the massification of the Australian higher education sector which started in 1989, with the expansion being funded by a widening of the funding base. In the ten years from 1989, Australian universities enrolled an additional 231,000 students, including an extra 189,000 in undergraduate bachelor degrees. Specific equity policies have further attempted to increase opportunities for students previously excluded from higher education. This paper looks at changes in the composition of the student body, and in the patterns of university funding. Using aggregated national student data sets, some of the changes which have arisen from massification are identified, with particular consideration of designated equity groups.     

‘Students that just hate school wouldn’t go’: educationally disengaged and disadvantaged young people’s talk about university education

This paper contributes to a growing body of literature on widening university participation and brings a focus on the classed and embodied nature of young people’s imagination to existing discussions. We interviewed 250 young people living in disadvantaged communities across five Australian states who had experienced disengagement from compulsory primary and secondary schooling. We asked them about their education and their educational futures, specifically how they imagined universities and university participation. For these young people, universities were imagined as ‘big’, ‘massive’ alienating schools. The paper explores how the elements of schooling from which these young people disengaged became tangible barriers to imagining and pursuing participation in university education. The primary barrier they described was their relationships with school teachers. Our analysis shows how relationships with teachers can impact the imagined improbability/probability of university participation. We offer suggestions for how barriers to university created by poor relationships with teachers may be overcome.     

Exploring Facilitators to Participation for Wheelchair Users at a South African University

ABSTRACT

The focus of research to date has been on barriers rather than facilitating factors to participation for wheelchair users at higher education institutions (HEIs). This article reports on a single case study that explored the facilitating factors which contributed to a young male student with a spinal cord injury’s participation at a South African university. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the student and two peers whom he identified as key informants. The interviews focused on exploring his lived experience to identify factors which the participants perceived as facilitators to participation at university. The four most prominent facilitating factors that emerged during the data analysis were his drive, attitude, disposition and relationships. As the young man fully engaged in a variety of occupations at university, his sense of independence and self-worth were enhanced, which in turn led to him having a meaningful and productive university life, being able to manage any of the barriers he encountered on campus.     

Bolstering graduates’ success through working as student ambassadors in university widening participation programs

Since 2010, the Higher Education Participation and Partnerships Program (HEPPP) has provided funding for Australian universities to ‘raise aspiration’ among under-represented groups. Underpinned by utilitarian discourses of human capital and individual capacitation, these resources have transformed the ways that universities seek to engage prospective students. This paper turns to an overlooked cohort that is integral to widening participation initiatives, but has rarely been the focus of research. These are the student ambassadors – university students who work within HEPPP programs. This paper reports findings from the alumni component of a mixed-method study which examines how widening participation programs, which are ostensibly directed at future university enrolments, might also help university students who work as student ambassadors to become successful professionals and citizens once they graduate from university. Alumni accounts of their experiences and self-reported impact of their ambassador work advocate a more holistic view of graduate success and how activities beyond mandatory coursework can contribute to success beyond university graduation. Evidence from student ambassador alumni suggests that these positive impacts are broad and long-lasting, contributing to students’ professional successes and personal lives.     

澳大利亚国际教育产业扩张:缘起、困境与反思

澳大利亚是高等教育产业化发展的典型,国际教育产业为其带来了巨额的经济收益。在产业化进程中,澳大利亚高校对于国际学生的依赖程度不断增加。自道金斯改革以来,澳大利亚高等教育系统被分化为一个高度管制的国内学生市场和自由放任的国际学生市场,在公共经费匮乏和大学排名的压力下,扩张国际教育产业成为大学经济理性下的必然选择。然而对教育经济价值的强调和市场效率的过分倚重,引发了舆论对教育公平、教学质量、教育目的多方面的质疑,也导致一场高等教育公共性的危机。     

Raised parental expectations towards higher education and the double bind

This paper is concerned with the participation of students from low socio-economic status (SES) families and communities in Australian higher education. One means of achieving this, as purported by the Australian Government and various universities, is through the raising of family aspirations or expectations. In this paper, I explore the localised effects of raised family aspirations as they are understood within the lived experiences of some students from a low SES context. Based on the interactions in four focus groups of eight participants and five follow-up individual interviews run in a low SES school in Western Sydney, I draw broadly on the method advanced by Giorgi [1985. Phenomenology and psychological research. Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press] to attend to how certain forms of high expectations communicated by parents may have a deleterious effect on student aspiration and attainment insofar as it positions the latter in a ‘double bind’. Such a situation can be inferred to significantly reduce the incentives for higher education participation.     

Improving the participation and engagement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in business education

Most Australian universities have among their goals to increase the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students at their institutions. In the Australian higher education context, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students are seriously under-represented, particularly in business education compared to other disciplines. An understanding of why a larger proportion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students do not choose to study a discipline that provides promising employment opportunities, is fundamental to improving the status quo. This paper reviews the literature to identify key barriers to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students’ participation and engagement in business education. Apart from multiple general barriers to participation in higher education, factors specific to business as a profession and as an academic discipline are also considered. The paper then discusses a number of strategies Australian educational institutions could pursue when seeking to increase participation and engagement of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in business. Drawing on the review, the paper concludes with recommendations for higher education institutional policy to further improve Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander student participation and engagement in business studies.     

借鉴澳大利亚经验转变我国留学生教育发展策略

如何扩大留学生教育规模,是目前高等教育国际化面临的热点课题。澳大利亚在较短时间内摆脱了留学生教育发展困境,一跃成为当今世界的主要留学生接收国,在国际留学生教育服务市场的占有率居高不下,其发展经验很有借鉴意义。本文集中对中澳两国留学生教育发展策略展开对比分析,力求以澳大利亚经验为基础,探索出一种切实可行的发展策略,推进我国留学生教育事业整体进程。     

Professional staff contributions to student retention and success in higher education

ABSTRACT

Student attrition remains a persistent problem within the Australian higher education sector. Contributing factors include financial, reputational and quality issues, which can pose significant risks for a university’s sustainability. Institutional culture is fundamental to decisions student make about withdrawing or remaining in higher education. Therefore, student retention requires a sustained, deeply embedded commitment from all parts of the institution, placing student experience at the forefront of all activities in the student lifecycle. Applying a lifecycle approach to the way in which institutions think about student retention benefits students by providing comprehensive and consistent support. Given that less is known about how professional staff contribute to student academic learning journeys as part of whole of institution responses to student retention, this paper focusses on the contributions that professional staff make within the student lifecycle and how they can most readily map their contributions to student retention and success.     

Expectation vs experience: might transition gaps predict undergraduate students’ outcome gaps?

Drawing on thematic analysis of one-to-one interviews with 85 undergraduate students, this paper offers initial, exploratory analysis of whether known outcome differentials may be partly attributable to students’ transition into university. The study is located in the English higher education sector, where fee increases have been accompanied by wider availability of metrics and outcome differentials have become a particular focus of attention. Specifically, this paper examines (in)congruence between students’ expectations of higher education and their experience while at university, tracking how recalled pre-arrival expectations correlate with socio-economic status and school type. In the case of students from ‘widening participation’ (WP) backgrounds, the effect of attendance on an intervention (access) programme is also considered. Findings point to a complex web of factors influencing the undergraduate experience of students within the same institution. For WP students, the widest gaps arise in relation to pedagogy, as the culture and curricula of higher education are initially found inconsistent with expectations. Intervention programmes make a small positive difference, primarily because social and academic confidence is enhanced. For students educated at independent schools, the widest gaps arise in relation to assessment, for which university-level support and guidance are felt to be less personalised than expected. On a structural level, findings question the reliability of output metrics as proxies for teaching quality given the extent to which they are predicted by students’ backgrounds and by the nature of their individual transition into higher education.