As
published in The Mercury 26th September 2020. It's an abridged
re-write of the previous blog Where to UTAS?)
IF
annual reports were marked like university assignments, the University of
Tasmania’s latest effort would receive one out of 10.
UTAS
reports on a calendar year basis. The Auditor General signed off the 2019
report in February. The Board (known as the Council) adopted the report in May
and sent it to the government as required. The government released the report
in late August, eight months after year’s end. Were it a listed company it
would have been suspended.
Apart
from the financials it’s a pretty skinny report. The overview for the year
occupied only six pages. Even then it contained a cut and paste from a previous
offering, a Strategic Plan dated July 2019. UTAS is “not long-term economically
sustainable and being economically sustainable is no easy task … At an
operating level, we break even. Still, there is no surplus to see our
facilities renewed for the next generation.”
The
brief review continued with a pastiche of proper nouns and acronyms which only
an insider could possibly comprehend. Four paragraphs on risk management
described how UTAS had worked collaboratively, reviewed, planned and
implemented recommendations. Exactly what was implemented to address what risks
wasn’t disclosed.
Essentially UTAS’s chosen transition to sustainability requires more students and that requires more student accommodation. Property development is now the tail wagging the education dog.