By George Lorenzo, Writer, Editor and Publisher

Like all higher education institutions, Australian colleges and universities face demands in which the development of effective teaching and learning environments, and the sharing of information and the facilitation of interaction between colleagues to bring about effective change and transformation related to teaching and learning, are of the highest priority.

In this brief report, I present an overview of a relatively new and interesting Australian higher education organization - The Carrick Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education Ltd - herein referred to as the The Carrick Institute. Before starting on The Carrick Institute, however, I thought it necessary to provide a fairly short review on the differences between higher education in Australia and higher education in the U.S.

It’s easy to see many considerable differences between Australian and U.S. higher education. For starters, in Australia there are 37 public and two private self-accrediting universities, one approved branch of an overseas university, four other self-accrediting higher education providers and around 130 non self-accrediting higher education providers. A self-accrediting higher education provider is authorized by the Australian government to accredit its own awards, and a non self-accrediting higher education provider is recognized under state or territory legislation. In 2005, there were 957,176 students attending Australian higher education provider institutions. ^{1, 2}

In addition, Australia has a relatively large post-secondary-school-level vocational and technical education sector (VET) that is comprised of 4,200 registered training providers, consisting of 78 Technical and Further Education (TAFE) institutions that can be considered similar to community colleges in the U.S. In 2004, approximately 1.6 million students enrolled in publicly funded vocational and technical education in Australia. ³

The U.S., on the other hand, has more than 1,900 2-year higher education institutions alone, and there are more than 2,000 4-year institutions. Overall, about 4,445 higher education institutions exist in the U.S. today. ⁴

The population of the U.S. is hovering close to 300 million, while the population of Australia is about 20 million. In terms of landmass, the U.S. and Australia are about equal in size. Higher education institutions in Australia are geographically distant from each other, whereas, in the U.S., colleges and universities are much closer to each other geographically. So, it’s no surprise that U.S. students are much more mobile, across institutions, than Australian students.

At the university level, the Australian government plays a much larger role in subsidizing higher education than the federal government does in the U.S. The Australian government is a primary contributor to university funding. Australia’s six states and two territories develop and implement policies around higher education. In the U.S., it’s the opposite, with states providing the bulk of education funds, and the federal government setting policies.

As in the U.S., messages and pathways that promote and support the transformation of higher education in Australia are loud and clear. Among them is the Australian government-funded $11.5 million 2006-2008 Disciplined-Based Initiatives Scheme managed by The Carrick Institute. The Carrick Institute came out of the 2003 "Our Universities: Backing Australia’s Future" reform package. It launched its planning phase in 2004, was fully operational in 2006, and has quickly become a high profile organization that has facilitated a great deal of collaboration between institutional leaders and academic staff across Australia

The Carrick Institute sponsors systemic sector-wide change toward excellence in learning and teaching. The Scheme’s objectives include promoting and supporting strategic change in higher education for the enhancement of learning and teaching; developing mechanisms to identify, develop, disseminate and embed good individual and institutional practice; and identifying emerging issues in Australian higher education. ⁵

As noted in its annual report:

The Institute’s strategic priorities are centered on five priority areas:

1. A Grants Scheme that includes a Leadership for Excellence in Learning and Teaching Programme; a Priority Projects Programme that addresses benchmarking, assessment and good practice; and a Competitive Grants Program that supports new technology, research and development, and approaches to learning and teaching that involve the increasing diversity of students, and that rewards teaching excellence.
2. A Discipline-based Initiatives Scheme to support the discipline-specific dissemination and application of best practice in learning and teaching (please see Accountability and Quality section).
3. A Resource Identification Network to disseminate to the higher education community good practice in learning and teaching.
4. The Carrick Fellowship Scheme to support leading educators to undertake high level international and national programs of research in learning and teaching.
5. A scheme for the Carrick Awards for Australian University Teaching. ⁷

The aforementioned teaching awards includes 27 $25,000 awards for teaching excellence, a single $50,000 Australian University Teacher of the Year Award, 14 $25,000 awards for programs that enhance learning, and 210 $10,000 awards for outstanding contributions to student learning. ⁸

Executive Director of The Carrick Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, Professor Richard Johnstone, uses terms such as "productive collaboration," "a culture of dissemination," a "culture of participation and enlistment," and "productive interchange," when he talks about the Institute. "It is not an Institute that is there to provide direction, instruction, or the ultimate source of expertise," he says. "It’s an organization that is there to identify, recognize, capitalize on, facilitate, and bring together the expertise that exists across the country, and to provide a productive mechanism for as many people as possible."

Johnstone adds that he has seen a "reassertion" or "re-energizing" commitment to good teaching in Australian higher education that has grown slowly over the past 15 years. He further explains that The Carrick Institute has grown out of a process that has been recognized by the Australian government as both an issue for individual institutions and an issue of national importance. And tied into this process is the recognition of "a link between students being taught well and producing the best graduates for employers in a competitive international environment. I don’t think that link was consciously recognized until recently."

Overall, The Carrick Institute is asserting the fundamental importance of teaching in higher education - an important role - as well as facilitating a much stronger sense of a culture among academics. Johnstone explains that being a teacher and a researcher means having a strong professional identity characterized by values, methodologies and ethical positions. "I think there are ways we can reinforce that identity by adding a layer of communication and interaction among academics."

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