Campus life faces a degree of change

If campus life was a new sitcom, it would come with a catchphrase - user pays.

Many students turning up for the start of the academic year this week, especially those at less wealthy universities, will notice a difference:
fewer clubs and societies, more expensive shops out sourced to private companies and new charges for legal, medical and psychological support.

Griffith University Institute for Higher Education director Kerri-Lee Krause says the changes - forced by laws outlawing mandatory services fees
could reinforce a shift that started over the past decade. Where once students saw university as a life experience, a rising number view it as a product they are buying.

"Students expect university will deliver rather than it actually being a lifestyle," she says."They see university as a service. Particularly international students say they want value for money."

Student demographics are changing: nearly a quarter are from overseas and pay hefty upfront fees for the right to study and in many cases later work - in Australia.

A survey earlier this decade found more than 70 per cent of full-time students work. Government figures show a declining number of students qualify for welfare and student debt albeit debt deferred until after study - is rising by $2 billion a year.

More students are choosing to study by distance, or do part of their degree online. The proportion of new students mixing external study with the classroom rose by 9 per cent last year.

Even student politicians no longer need to be on campus. Ben Davison, president of the Deakin University Student Association, missed Orientation Week last week due to his full-time job as a Labor Party electoral officer in Ballarat.Melbourne University higher education chair Richard James says students were increasingly mixing study and work.

"We know that the typical student these days is doing a lot of part-time
work (during semester). Traditional student work patterns of working in
vacation just arent available anymore," he says.

It means less leisure time on campus for barbecues, clubs and societies and student politics. The number of student union affiliated clubs at RMIT has dropped from about 150 to 38 since 2003.

Students no longer have to pay student union and services fees of up to
$500. Union membership is voluntary and cheaper between $130 and $265.

At Monash, food and drink is about 20 per cent more expensive for non-
members, parking 235 per cent more costly.

Monash associate dean of teaching Mark Peel says the change to the university experience is sometimes overstated, but if students were less
engaged it was at least partly because of the rise on campus of people from different backgrounds.

"There is a much greater proportion of people coming to university now who are the first in their families to come to university," he said.

"Those students often take university very seriously its not just about the
money and the time youre investing people are thinking if they are going
to succeed in the world you need a professional qualification."


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