Posted 1st May
On the 5th of April, the AUU and SRC jointly released their first policy paper in three years, '2-Minute Students: A Snapshot of Student Poverty at the University of Adelaide'. The report is ‘urging the federal government to include urgent and long-awaited reforms to student income support [in the budget]’.
The report specifically calls for:
1. Aligning the threshold for [the] Parental Income Test with the value used by [the] Family Tax Benefit
2. Reducing the Age of Independence to qualify for Austudy from 25 to 21
3. Increasing the Personal Income Threshold to $400 per fortnight
4. And finally, expanding benefit eligibility for students enrolled in all masters by coursework programs
So, in a nutshell, the report aims to improve the coverage of student welfare, urging that this is necessary as it needed to make education accessible for those from lower socio-economic backgrounds.
The report firstly outlines the recent Marriage of Convenience student action which took place on the 25th of March. It then includes personal stories of all those who chose to give them at the same action, describing their experiences of student poverty.Some of the saddest stories detail the personal experiences of rural students, who have no choice but to leave home to go to university, and often find it very difficult to support themselves while studying. A lot of students also decry the high costs of textbooks and other educational aids, which can often cost up to $1000 in some courses and significantly hurt the hip pocket of self-supporting students. Many also describe their frantic attempts to earn $18,000 in 18 months (one of the ways to achieve eligibility).
The paper also contains some statistical information about the number of students accessing student loans at the University of Adelaide. In 2008, 602 students sought out these interest-free loans, which are administered by the union (through Student Care) and paid for by the university.
On April 7th, the AUU, the NTEU (National Tertiary Education Union) and the University of Adelaide released a joint media release stressing the need for better student income. I was impressed to see Vice Chancellor McWha lending his personal weight to it, as student income support remains a controversial issue among the wider student body. A copy of this press release is included in the report, along with a more detailed policy briefing written by the National Union of Students (NUS).
Overall, it’s a very convincing report, combining statistical with anecdotal evidence to push its agenda. From what I understand, it was compiled almost entirely by AUU President Lavinia Emmett-Grey. SRC President Paris Dean had no input into it. I point this only in that it’s not the first time Paris has been kept out of the loop on SRC business. The personal rift between him and Lavinia is something of an open secret, and has in the past damaged the procedural integrity of SRC operations (most visibly in the previous NDA, where he and NUS State President Robert Fletcher were not made aware of the plans for 'A Marriage of Convenience' until after almost everyone else. The fact that it was an unambiguously successful event served to make this much less of a scandal than it would otherwise have been).
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