Curtin Business School gets an “F”

“At the end of the day, is university about the profits you make or is it about the quality of education you deliver to the students?” Curtin University Business School pro-vice chancellor Tony Travaglione was given an examination on 21 March. He failed.

Travaglione was confronted by hundreds of business students whose lecturer has been sacked – a casualty of a wave of cuts that are sweeping Curtin University.

Education vice president of the Curtin Student Guild, Miranda Wood, led the students from their lecture to the business school foyer. When management refused to see them, students chanted “Stairs!” and proceeded to the fifth floor administrative offices for a sit-in.

Students demanded that the economics lecturer keep her job.

Answers were hard to come by from Travaglione, who continually deflected yes or no questions – prompting a student to heckle “You could be Tony Abbott, you never answer!”

The pro-vice chancellor ultimately blamed the mid-semester sacking on the NTEU, stating, “The reason that we’re in this position is that the union asked for further consultation.”

Clearly university management had wanted to push the redundancies through over the summer break when no one is around – a favoured move of universities around the country.

According to the NTEU, about 70 academic staff and 60 administrative staff have been made redundant across the university this year.

Student solidarity with staff and more protest actions against university management – and the federal government’s higher education cuts – are needed.