Queensland University of Technology takes aim at performing arts degrees

Queensland University of Technology (QUT) has put the future of its creative arts programs at risk. The university paused the 2025 undergraduate dance intake to conduct a review, which quickly expanded to include all performing arts courses. The review’s terms of reference note that performing arts degrees are “experiencing fluctuating student demand, attrition and research performance ... amid increased competition and national decline in interest in these study areas”.

Meanwhile, performing arts students received an email framing the review as a way to “support our commitment to continually improving our courses and to meet student expectations and aspirations”. The reason for the review is likely to justify attacks on QUT students’ right to study specialised degrees.

QUT has been on the attack against performing arts courses and staff conditions since 2021, when it cut the dance performance degree and merged three faculties. QUT sacked up to 1,500 staff during the pandemic due to expected lost profits. In reality, QUT’s annual report recorded a $139.9 million operating surplus in 2021, $17.85 million of which came from reduced “employee-related expenses”. In other words, QUT saved millions through staff cuts and wage freezes.

QUT is the only public university in Queensland to offer specialised degrees in subjects like dance and technical production, which was cut to a minor this year. Cutting the dance degree would mean students in Queensland would be forced to travel interstate or pay for training at expensive private studios.

Staff at QUT are also under threat. After years of transitioning towards prerecorded lectures, bigger class sizes, and with staff squeezed by just ten minutes of paid marking time, QUT has turned its sights on the performing arts staff, too.

The teachers and the staff who maintain the state-of-the-art facilities are now at risk of redundancies. Dance students are taught at a $60 million facility at the Kelvin Grove campus, which boasts specialised dance studios, black box drama theatres, concert halls and recording studios. Margaret Sheil, QUT’s vice-chancellor, seems willing to throw all of this away to prioritise profit-making.

University managers are looking at other cost-cutting measures. The QUT Art Museum has had all planned 2025 exhibitions cancelled. There is no better explanation for this than the one provided by Sheil herself at a staff forum last year: “It’s looking at some of the nice-to-do things that had more benefits for the community than QUT”.

This is the problem with university education being run for profit. For QUT managers, creative arts are “nice-to-do” and good for society but are not big moneymakers. Compare the treatment of the arts to the brand new $7.8 million Space Technology Precinct. There is cash to burn when the university can guarantee large research grants and outside funding.

The cuts are not isolated to QUT; cost-cutting is on the agenda across Australia. The threat posed to performing arts degrees is the canary in the coal mine. They set a precedent for future cuts in other faculties.

Students facing course cuts at any university have a responsibility to stand up. We should not only study whatever we want, regardless of how profitable, but also defend the rights of the staff that facilitate it.

University education should be free, publicly owned and funded, and run for the benefit of students and society, not for vice-chancellors and administrations to make millions of dollars.