Job (Un)Ready

Welcome to you both.

Thank you.

Great to be

here.

Labor said that JRG was unfair, that his job-ready graduates was unfair and wrong in principle but has not got rid of it.

Perhaps, Charlie, I'll go to you first on this.

Was there an expectation among students that this was going to be got rid of? And what's the sort of tone of conversation among students about what appears to be paralysis on this question?

Absolutely.

Students expected for it to go when the Labor government came into power.

Labor is a party of education, a party of education policy.

I think we also had an expectation for that to happen.

It is certainly disappointing to see it not happen yet.

I know there's some mechanics with A-Tech and stuff that's in there, but there was a general expectation from students that it was going to go.

In terms of how students are feeling, I mean, Most of the cohort that are studying an undergraduate degree now don't know any different, don't know what it was like before JRG.

There's almost a bit of an information thing that I think Felix and I know in student representation, we have to tell a story.

We have to tell about, this is how much you're paying.

This is how much your older siblings might have paid.

I think that's only something that we're trying to do, but a lot of students don't quite realize just how bad it is.

until you sort of ask them to go into their ATO and say, oh yeah, here's $50,000, $60,000.

That's a lot of money.

And I think some students get very angry about it when they see that.

Yeah.

Felix, do you want to just sort of explain to us what JRG is in terms of its logic, as far as you understand it?

Yeah.

So, JRG was introduced by Scott Morrison with the intention of driving students to particular degrees, essentially creating demand based off price.