The inability of our universities to employ sufficient staff to meet the growing needs of students is compromising the attention which staff can devote to students. There simply isn't enough time to give students the individual tuition and advice that was once a standard part of a university education. The increasing reliance on casual staff compounds this problem, with these staff less available to students and less able to develop their own academic careers. This is a direct result of the cuts to government funding and the inadequacy of private funding in keeping pace with the real increases in costs to universities. These figures add to the mountain of evidence which shows that the government must increase public funding immediately to save the quality of Australia's universities.
Time is almost up.
The policies prepared for this year's election must contain equitable solutions to the inadequate funding of our universities in order to allow them to provide quality education. To see a table illustrating the decline in student to teaching staff ratios at Australian Universities 1989-2000 click here .