- Title
- On becoming a university student: young people and the 'illusio' of higher education
- Creator
- Patfield, Sally; Gore, Jennifer; Fray, Leanne
- Relation
- Reimagining the Higher Education Student: Constructing and Contesting Identities p. 10-26
- Relation
- Society for Research into Higher Education
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9780367854171-2
- Publisher
- Routledge
- Resource Type
- book chapter
- Date
- 2021
- Description
- In Australia, the contemporary higher education landscape is characterised by two pervasive, but closely related, discourses. First, access to higher education is a significant commodity, with the economic importance of a university education for the individual strategically intertwined with the federal government’s own pecuniary ambitions for the nation (Commonwealth of Australia, 2016; Pitman, 2012). Second, universities provide a significant social justice apparatus, giving rise to the idea of a ‘fair chance for all’, whereby the spoils of a university education can supposedly be enjoyed by a more diverse range of Australians (Department of Employment, Education and Training, 1990). Together, these discourses foreground what Gale and Hodge (2014) call the new ‘higher education imaginary’, in which economic and social agendas coalesce as the government jostles for position in the global knowledge economy. Arguably, then, the macro-level role of universities has shifted in recent decades, with higher education becoming ‘less about what students learn and more about what students are worth’ (Blackmore, 2003, p. 2).
- Subject
- university students; young people; higher education; Australia; illusio; SDG 4; Sustainable Development Goals
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1439572
- Identifier
- uon:40965
- Identifier
- ISBN:9780367426538
- Language
- eng
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