Staff Cut Worries Academics And Students

Plans to cut staff at a number of Australian Universities next year have provoked anger among academics, who have vowed to fight the moves, and prompted students to express concern about larger class sizes.

As the academic year draws to a close, the National Tertiary Education Union says about one-third of Australian universities have indicated that they plan to reduce staff numbers next year. The union represents more than 25,000 academics and other employees at the country’s 39 universities, as well as those at some vocational education institutions.

“We’ve had a plague of universities saying that they need to make redundancies as they finalize their numbers for the year,” said Jeannie Rea, the union’s president.

Jesse Marshall, president of the National Union of Students, which says it represents about one million students, said staff cuts had become increasingly common in recent years.

“Australian universities are, in many cases, shirking their responsibilities to support and educate students by using overworked and underpaid short-term staff in increasingly significant teaching roles,” he said in an e-mail.

Mr. Marshall said student-staff ratios at Australian universities had ballooned in recent years, leaving students with a less rewarding classroom experience.

“With more students in each class, there is less room for critical debate and inquiry, and for ideas to be contested and discussed,” he said. “This trend is of grave concern.”

In a move that may further increase financial pressure on universities, the federal government last week announced funding cuts for higher education, including abolishing performance-target funds, which amount to 240 million Australian dollars, or about $250 million, over four years, as part of its midyear budget statement.

Universities Australia, which represents the country’s universities, expressed disappointment after the announcement.

“Any fiscal adjustments to higher education are unfortunate, and there is a danger of death by a thousand cuts as successive budgets drop and defer program commitments each time,” said Glenn Withers, the group’s chief executive. “Universities are therefore wary, though are comforted that major reform programs established by this government are affirmed.”

The University of Sydney and Victoria University are among those institutions that have announced they intend to reduce staff numbers next year.

The University of Sydney, one the country’s largest, has announced that it will cut staffing costs by 7.5 percent next year to help finance a backlog of building repairs and maintenance, and investment in information technology.

The university’s budget projections fell short after more domestic students deferred courses or took lighter loads and the international student market was hampered by a strong Australian dollar and uncertainty about government policy changes, the vice chancellor, Michael Spence, told staff in a video statement last month.

“First, we need to release resources that we currently spend on administration,” he said. “Second, we can no longer carry members of the university who are not pulling their weight: It is simply too expensive to do so.”

Mr. Spence said the university needed to “consider the position of that small minority of academics who do not contribute significantly either to our research or teaching.”

“We are expecting that a number of academic staff will be offered redundancies, pre-retirement contracts, a rebalancing of their duties and the like,” he said.

Victoria University plans to cut 30 positions from its Technical and Further Education division next year.

“The university faces a funding shortfall of 3.2 million dollars as a result of new funding arrangements from the state government to take effect from the new year,” Paul Lefebvre, vice president for people and culture at the university, said in an e-mailed statement. “As a result of these cuts, courses that are not attracting viable numbers will be forced to close. Unfortunately, this will inevitably lead to redundancies as a smaller number of courses means we will not need as many staff.”

Macquarie University has made offers to some staff members who have indicated that they are interested in taking a severance package or early retirement. The university has not yet released figures of the number of staff involved.

The University of Sydney has proposed that academic staff members will be assessed based on their research output, a development that concerns the academics’ union.

Ms. Rea, the union president, said further staff cuts could result in fewer courses’ being offered to students or fewer tutorials.

“One of the current trends that is very worrying,” she said, “is cutting out tutorials, moving them from once a week to once a fortnight — delivery methods that are making it more and more difficult for students to get the attention and feedback that they need.”