New Australian University Promoting On-line Degrees

University of Adelaide advertisement,
Parramatta Road, Sydney,
Photo by Tom Worthington, 9 August 2025

Adelaide University, formed from University South Australia and University of Adelaide, is promoting it's online education. The 'launch from anywhere" campaign appears on a bus shelter in a main street in Sydney, as well as on social media. This bus stop is on Parramatta Road, which fronts three universities (Sydney, UTS and Notre Dame). It is a daring move for one of Australia's leading universities to promote e-learning  and so close to major campuses. Would those a short bus ride from established universities choose to study online, at a university 1,000km away?

Adelaide is also home to Torrens University, the Australian arm of a multinational online learning provider. However, while Torrens has elearning as its core business (supplemented with campuses across Australia), Adelaide University was formed from two conventional campus based institutions. Australia's capital city research universities have tended to keep their online offerings low key, for fear of being seen as low quality. Universities run occasional weird e-learning TV advertisements, or provide e-learning at arms length though Open Universities Australia.

The campaign is aimed at Australians, with international students being excluded. Student visas ban fully online study. However a student who is in another country, and doesn't visit Australia doesn't need a visa. They could complete a degree online without leaving home. I did this 2013 to 2016, studying in Canada, from Canberra.

It may be that Adelaide University has judged offshore students would not be willing to pay full fees. In contrast domestic online students pay the same fees as on campus students. When studying online at an Australian university 1,000 km away I was a little annoyed I was paying for the upkeep of playing fields I never used, or saw. ;-)

ASCILITE 2025 at University of South Australia

Greetings from the closing session of ASCILITE 2024, where University of South Australia  have been announced at the hosts for the conference next year. This will be one of the last events hosted by the university before it formally merges with University of Adelaide. The theme is "Continuous Change" with is appropriate for higher education. Given the Australian Government's failure to have a coherent policy, a better theme might be "Bin Fire". 

Australian Universities in Top Tier for Work in Singapore Excludes Adelaide

The Singapore Ministry of Manpower has included seven of Australia's top universities in their top tier for work passes in the COMPASS Program, due to take effect in September. Graduates of these universities get twice as many points as others, towards a work pass in Singapore.  

1. Australian National University, 
2. University of Melbourne Australia, 
3. University of New South Wales, 
4. University of Queensland, 
5. University of Sydney, 
6. University of Western Australia.

These are seven out of the eight universities in Australia's Group of Eight leading universities. Missing from Singapore's list is the University of Adelaide, which comes lowest of the eight on global rankings. However, it should be noted that the ranking systems tend to be skewed towards research quality, and have little to do with the quality of education provided. Singapore's use of these rankings is questionable, unless the workers are being recruited for research jobs, not business, or industry. 

New Australian Higher Education and Research Buildings

Australia appears to have faith in the financial viability of higher education, judging by the new buildings featured in Architecture Australia (AA) and Architectural Review Asia Pacific (ARAP). AA March/April 2014 features the Science and Engineering Building by Sinclair Knight Merz at Federation University Australia (previously University of Ballarat), the Cairns Institute by Woods Bagot at James Cook University and the Doherty Institute, University of Melbourne, UTS Broadway by Denton Corker Marshall for University of Technology Sydney, the Braggs Building by BVN Donivin Hill for University of Adelaide and the Translational Research Institute by Wilson Architects and Donovin Hill for University of Queensland and Queensland University of Technology.

While impressive looking buildings from the outside, they don't appear that innovative on the inside. Perhaps constrained by the conservative ideas of the clients, the building have traditional looking labs and teaching rooms. The Cairns Institute has what is called an "Interactive Lecture Theatre", but this turns out to just have fixed benches and ordinary chairs, much like the ANU Design Unit style of lecture theatre for the Australian National University fifty years ago.

How these buildings will adapt to the new research and educational environment, where most activities will be carried out online, is not clear. Within five to ten years the typical student will never need to visit a campus. A few students using specialised equipment may need to visit a campus for a few days a year. If the Australian economy is to prosper, researchers will similarly need to be pushed out into industry, corporations and government (the so-called Cambridge Phenomenon). There is little value in researchers sitting in an ivory tower, no matter how prettily these are now clad in shimmering steel. There will still be a need for administration and support staff to run universities, but as with the students and researchers, there will be no compelling reason for them to be in a big building at a campus.

Perhaps the best view of the future of the university campus is QUT Science and Engineering Centre. This has a gym, swimming pool, food court and children's educational centre. Less obvious are places for groups of students to study, tutorial rooms, lecture theatres and administrative offices.