Australia facing academic shortfall
Australia’s academics are old, stressed and overworked, and universities are heading for a teaching crisis in the next five years when a quarter of them will retire.
The approaching academic shortage has involved just a 28% increase in staff at a time when there has been a 107% increase in student numbers between 1989 and 2007, inflating the average student-to-staff ratio from 13 to 21.
A Melbourne University study has shown that Australian academics are highly likely to change jobs – either out of the profession or out of the country – and are less satisfied with their work than international colleagues.
The study report recommends attracting more PhD candidates to become academics and states that “if the ambitious government targets for further expansion are to be met without a parallel increase in academic staff numbers, it will be difficult to see how this cannot lead to a deterioration of quality”.
Study co-author, Professor Lynn Meek, said that “our study’s findings do not bode well for the future prospects of the academic profession in Australia. The sector needs to attract our nation’s best and brightest young people and to do this major change needs to take place”.
