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Australia Plans University Fees Hike to Deter Humanities Students

posted by Fnord666 on Sunday June 21 2020, @11:53PM   

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Australia's conservative government announced plans Friday to double university fees for humanities students, in a bid to push people into more useful, "job-relevant" courses like maths and science.

Under the proposal—which critics panned as an "ideological assault"—the cost of degrees like history or cultural studies will rise up to 113 percent to around US$29,000, while other courses such as nursing and information technology will become cheaper.

Education Minister Dan Tehan—an arts graduate with two advanced degrees in international relations—said the government wanted to corral young people towards "jobs of the future" to boost the country's economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.

"If you are wanting to do philosophy, which will be great for your critical thinking, also think about doing IT," Tehan said.

The plan would help pay for an additional 39,000 university places by 2023 and for cost cuts for courses like science, agriculture, maths and languages.

[...] "I'm an arts graduate and so is the minister for education so I'm not sure you can draw the conclusion that we're completely unemployable," said opposition lawmaker Tanya Plibersek.

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Original Submission

• Re:All Countries Should Do This (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2020, @05:33AM

  by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2020, @05:33AM (#1010992)

  Apparently then, you missed the post-truth rationale used to justify the "strike"? Before we get to that, Weinstein once famously pointed out. [wa.gov]

  There is a huge difference between a group or coalition deciding to voluntarily absent themselves from a shared space in order to highlight their vital and underappreciated roles....and a group encouraging another group to go away. The first is a forceful call to consciousness, which is, of course, crippling to the logic of oppression. The second is a show of force, and an act of oppression in and of itself.

  Which is the Shut Down Stem? Nobody I know is going on "strike" over easily disprovable claims, never mind being excluded on behalf of third parties. Let's investigate the claims. [cfact.org]

  What IS odd, however, is that none of the STEM stop work scientist groups ever brought up the elephant in the room – the poor performance of Black American students in far too many of our urban high schools (which has little or nothing to do with any lack of inherent ability and everything to do with the racism of big city political machines).

  So we'd be striking because Democrat run big cities are racist? The first part of the quoted claim is true, if the second is true why would a strike be a better course of action than the ballot box? The entire premise of your "call to strike" (which isn't) can only exist in a post-truth reality.

  In STEM, we create technologies that affect every part of our society and are routinely weaponized against Black people.

  Just what kind of massive racists are behind ShutDownStem? [shutdownstem.com] Nothing I've worked on in my jobs over 3 decades has ever been weaponized against anyone. This shit makes creationism look sane, everyone needs to apologize to Kent Hovind right now!

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