In the Great Hall of Sydney University last night a debate was held on the statement 'Too many people go to university'. The topic was of course far too complex to solve in the two hours given for this ‘chamber’ debate. However the ideas each side came up with were interesting and really, for the betterment of Australia’s higher-education system, the debate of future funding and focus for policy should now move from the halls of universities to the halls of parliament.
The Affirmative’s first argument focused on the fact that for Australia to remain competitive in the global economy it would have to accept that industry and employment were changing and the way young people were educated would have to reflect that shift. The first speaker Andrew Smith, the Executive Director of the Australian Council for Private Education and Training (ACPECT) argued that the private sector could solve many of these problems serving to design niche and small scale courses that would create an industry focus for the student. As he made in his most prescient point there needed to be ‘institutions that are in and of their industries’.
Michael Spence the Vice-Chancellor of Sydney Uni then stood up and began waxing lyrically on the benefits of critical thinking, new ideas, and the ‘core intellectual flexibility you can only get at university’.
He then strayed onto a point that perhaps wasn’t as powerful, that the vocational and the investigative could be melded so that everybody ‘that has the capacity or the desire to attend university should be able to’.
The argument was of course shaky.
In the real world as Steven Hind (Debates Director for University of Sydney Union) we can’t have plumbers that can fix a tap but are then more interested in analysing the tap’s hydrology.
Naomi Oreb contended otherwise and provided data we’ve all heard- that university education provides a better income and better quality of life.
Even if the degree seems useless and broad from the outside
Stephen Matchett a writer for The Australian, as third speaker echoed much of what had been said and rebutted again along the lines of providing an alternative, a choice and accepting the fact that universities weren’t the only place where education and training could occur.
The debate though was not nearly over, Adam Spencer, a former gun debater at Sydney University stood up and eloquently dismantled any argument telling personal stories about what university education had done for his ‘life trajectory’ from the working classes and that if, as Steven Hind contended that many students made mistakes by going to courses they didn’t really want to do, he answered ‘well it’s not a bad mistake as far as mistakes go’
He then uttered my favourite rebuttal of the night.
On the contention that enlarging the quantity of students had reduced its quality, he quipped ‘well you wouldn’t hear anybody say that who wasn’t in the system’.
So after a quick trip to the floor and back to the debaters the debate finished with both sides having put forward good arguments. The negative side seemed to have the better debaters and probably the advantage from the outset but some questions still remain.
Do you think there are too many people at university? Would people be better suited outside the system? And how should funding reflect your opinion?
If you were wondering, the debate ended with 71% of the crowd agreeing with the negative side's argument (up from 44% in a pre-debate poll), and only 24% agreed with the affirmative (down from 37%). The amount of undecided also fell from 19% before, to 5% after the arguments were made.