A major federal government reform designed to steer students into “job-ready” fields has instead saddled many Indigenous students with higher fees and greater debt, according to education leaders.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Indigenous Strategy and Services) at the University of Sydney, Professor Reuben Bolt - a Yuin/Wandandian and Monaro/Ngarigo man - says the Job-Ready Graduates (JRG) scheme has disproportionately hurt Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students.
“Job-Ready Graduates needs to be replaced with a fairer system,” Professor Bolt told NITV.
“It’s had little impact on students’ subject choices, but the disproportionate negative financial impacts are significant and could be making some of Australia’s most vulnerable students - including First Nations, women and first-in-family who tend to want to study humanities - put off enrolling at university at all.”
Introduced in 2020, the JRG package lowered fees for some courses such as teaching and nursing, while sharply increasing them for degrees in humanities, law and business.
Professor Bolt says many Indigenous students are choosing to study the very disciplines hardest hit by fee hikes.
“We’ve seen Indigenous students continue to enrol in the humanities disciplines that are most impacted by the JRG, which means they are now having to pay more for the same degree and incurring greater debt,” he said.
The University of Sydney opposed the scheme from the outset, warning in its 2020 submission that it would penalise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students and undermine teaching in Indigenous culture and language.
Those concerns were later confirmed by the Australian Universities Accord, which found the JRG package unfairly burdened students in the humanities and recommended reforms to bring fees in line with graduates’ likely lifetime earnings.
Universities Australia Chair Professor Carolyn Evans agrees the system is inequitable.
“I believe it is unfair because some students - in business, law, humanities and society - are expected to pay almost the whole cost of their education with the government contributing very little, while others receive very large amounts of government funding and pay far less,” she told NITV.
Professor Evans says the JRG reforms were based on a flawed assumption.
"The government’s stated intention was to encourage students to study in areas with good career outcomes and to discourage them from studying in other areas,” she said.
“However, there was never a strong link between career outcomes and the cost. Law students, for example, often have better employment outcomes than many science students.
"Also, students tend not to choose a degree just because it is cheaper - they (rightly in my view) are more concerned about the study and careers they are interested in.”
She says this disconnect has made the policy particularly damaging for students who face financial barriers.
“Students from low socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to be deterred by debt.
"Far more students from low SES backgrounds have been discouraged from studying in the most expensive band than medium or high SES students,” she said.
“While the JRG is not the only reason for this, we certainly hear students saying that this is the reason they are unsure about coming to university.”
Around a third of Indigenous students are enrolled in the humanities and social science disciplines hardest hit by the changes.
Professor Evans warns this could send the wrong message.
“I am concerned that the highest level of payment tells students that subjects like law, business and humanities are not for students from low SES backgrounds.
"I know this is not the position of the government, but the JRG sends that message implicitly.”
Professor Bolt agrees the policy has “without question” widened the gap in higher education for Indigenous students.
“We’re really concerned students enrolled in these higher-fee courses are going to be lumbered with significant debt and that this is affecting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and other groups of students disproportionately,” he said.
“Without question Job-Ready Graduates has not narrowed the gap for Indigenous students.
"We’re very concerned by the extent to which the high fees may be preventing Indigenous students believing and experiencing that university can be a place for them.”
Both Bolt and Evans are urging the federal government to move quickly on reforms flagged by the Accord.
Universities Australia has already proposed removing the highest fee band and redistributing costs more evenly across disciplines.
“Over the longer term, we would like to see a more equitable sharing of the cost of university between the student and the taxpayer,” Professor Evans said.
Professor Bolt says a fairer system should focus on equity and reflect graduates’ future earning capacity.
“I personally would like to move towards a model where students who have barriers to accessing higher education are able to do so without fees,” he said.
For Evans, reforms must ensure universities remain accessible for all.
“We need to see funding for teaching and research that covers the cost of these activities,” she said.
“Otherwise, students and staff will be unreasonably stretched and public universities will seem out of reach for some students.”
