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UCL closure kills Uni City dream in Adelaide

By Malcolm King - posted Tuesday, 3 February 2015


Adelaide's university city plan is dead.

The closure of the University College London (UCL) Adelaide campus in 2017 ends South Australia's relationship with one of the world's great research universities.

The campus opened in Victoria Square in 2010 as part of the former Rann Government's strategy to create a university city. The aim was to draw expertise and knowledge together in a cultural research network and drive the commercialisation of intellectual property.

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Sounds a bit 'airy fairy' doesn't it? The 'commercialisation of intellectual property'. But here's the strength of university cities. Researchers working together from different institutions on the intersecting boundaries of their own fields, make world-breaking findings across the sciences. That's is what's happening with cancer research.

The researchers not only bring money and kudos to the cities in which they work but also more researchers of a world class standard. It doesn't happen over night. It takes 20 years or so. It's the reverse of brain drain, something Adelaide has in spades.

UCL blamed 'academic and financial risk and a change to its international strategy' for the pending closure. But the real reason was UCL's utter dissatisfaction with Premier Jay Weatherill and the state government who had walked away from the project.

In 2012, former UCL President and Provost Professor Malcolm Grant accused the state government of failing to drive the university-city agenda. UCL had come to Adelaide, despite the challenge of entering a new market in lean times, because of its central location in Australia and reach to Asian markets.

UCL currently employs 22 staff and has about 100 local and international Master of Science students, specialising in resources and energy.The campus was doing so well that six months ago its Adelaide CEO David Travers, was consideringexpanding its postgraduate programs and pursuing partnerships with other Australian universities.

In 2011 it signed a five year $10M deal with BHP Billiton to establish an Institute for Financial Resources in London and an International Energy Policy Institute in Adelaide. UCL had planned to expend one million pounds this year on the Adelaide campus to drive growth.

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UCL Adelaide is research-led with a strong emphasis on postgraduate education. Training and teaching is informed by the latest research conducted by staff. It's specialisation in resources and energy is strategically important to SA and the campus has significant outreach and public engagement.

The South Australian government provided UCL with $4.5m worth of support across its first seven years, while Santos provided $10m across five years. It's the only international university in Adelaide that has attracted corporate investment. Much of its success can be attributed to Travers.

UCL is ranked the fifth best university in the world by the QS World Universities Rankings and is rated 21st by both the Academic Ranking of World Universities and the Times Higher Education rankings (2013). It is one of the most prestigious research and teaching universities in the world. The University of Adelaide ranks 100th in the QS World Universities Rankings. The difference between the two institutions is not incremental. It's logarithmic.

In 2011Kaplan planned to accredit its courses in partnership with the University of Adelaide but the deal crumbled. In 2010, Cranfield University closed in Adelaide. It had focused on a student cohort that was supposed to emerge from South Australia's 'booming' defence industries. It never happened.

Carnegie Mellon is still operating. One of its core missions was to train local mid level public servants how to research, create and implement cutting edge public policy. Unfortunately, graduates ran in to the same executive management regression when these young 'upstarts' started generating new models and ideas. Weep for my beloved Adelaide.

The year 2017 is turning out to be a date with destiny for SA as that's the year Holden closes and the AWD project terminates, throwing thousands of manufacturing workers out of a job. South Australia's currently exports just 4.3 per cent of Australia's goods and services. State GDP growth is languishing at 1.3 per cent per annum. About half that of Australia's. The economy is regressing and is in deep, deep trouble.

While its true that Adelaide may never be a new Oxford or Cambridge, these true international universities who have fled our shores may have played an important role in rectifying SA's dire lack of economic diversity and intellectual rigour. We'll never know now.

Adelaide is the most conservative city in Australia and it's lumbering in to a period of deep economic chaos. All that is now solid will melt. It has so far sought to ameliorate the effects of globalisation, a lack of diverse industries and the decline of manufacturing and construction, with typically old world remedies such as pump priming companies who in five years time, will go the way of the dinosaur. It praises bricks and mortar in a Google world. School kids know what happens to species who fail to adapt.

The fall of UCL will bring some relief to the local 'Big Three' universities who feared its global reputation while at the same time they desperately trying to fill their undergraduate programs from a dwindling number of young domestic applicants.

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About the Author

Malcolm King is a journalist and professional writer. He was an associate director at DEEWR Labour Market Strategy in Canberra and the senior communications strategist at Carnegie Mellon University in Adelaide. He runs a writing business called Republic.

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