The university as the spearhead of globalization

Higher education & Globalization

The University as the Spearhead of Globalization

At present, higher education is increasingly becoming competitive globally. The increasingly competitive environment existing among higher education institutions was predicted by Harman (as cited in Bradmore & Smyrnios, 2009, p. 497) to potentially cause the closure of some universities or the merging of universities with others. Bradmore and Smyrnios (2009) believe that there is a need for Australian universities to become more competitive since "there is still considerable doubt in the minds of many about the capacity of all Australian universities to maintain their market positions" (p. 497). It for this reason that Bradmore and Smyrnios (2009) decided to conduct a study and look into the level of concern that Australian public universities have regarding the competition in the global higher education environment that is recently rapidly intensifying. The study also aimed to know the extent Australian public universities are responding to the increasing competition. In order to answer these objectives, the published strategic plans of Australian public universities in the years 2005-2007 were gathered and analyzed through content analysis.

Results of the research showed that Australian public universities do not pay enough attention to the threats brought about by the rapidly intensifying competition in the higher education environment globally as far as strategic planning practices and processes are concerned. Furthermore, results showed that Australian public universities are, to a certain degree, also conscious of the threats brought about by the rapidly intensifying competition. They are employing strategies to protect their market share and position by focusing on concepts of students, research, teaching, learning, education, staff, and region. This study has an implication in as far as determining if Australian public universities pay sufficient attention to the rapid intensification of local and global competition; strategies that have been implemented and are currently being implemented to appropriately address the increasing competition; and the other possible courses of action that can be undertaken in order to develop better models that will serve as guide to competitive behavior.

This study utilized content analysis in order to answer the research objectives. Published strategic plans of 34 Australian public universities were gathered. Published strategic plans are strategic plans that are freely available. These are published plans that are made available to all parties. These published strategic plans do not contain other pertinent information that is considered classified. The study made use of a list of 37 Australian public universities, which was obtained in 2001 from the National Report on Higher Education (Bradmore & Smyrnios, 2009). The Internet websites of these 37 universities were visited in April 2005 wherein the published strategic plans were identified and downloaded. Only 34 strategic plans were obtained and these were arranged to show universities in the manner developed by Marginson and Considine, the five-tier classification which included Sanstones, Redbricks, Unitechs, Gumtrees, and New.

Data was analyzed using the complete set of public strategic plans. In order to proceed with the content analysis, the Leximancer was used in order to provide an objective reading of the strategic plans which is also automated and systematic. According to Bradmore and Smyrnios (2009), Leximancer is "a data-mining tool that can be used to analyze the content of collections of textual documents' (as cited in Smith, 2005, p. 4, p. 4; p. 499 & 501). The results of the study showed that in terms of the level of concern the Australian public universities have on the rapid intensification of global competition among higher education institutions, only one university included competition in the 10 top-ranked concepts. Furthermore, competition is only among the 100 top-ranked concepts in just 25 universities. These findings led Bradmore and Smyrnios to propose that Australian public universities have indeed lagged behind the 'race' to become competitive in achieving globalization in the "higher education movement" (p. 205). With regard the extent to which universities respond to the increasing competition, findings showed that there is a prominence of focus on concepts such as students, research, teaching, learning, education, staff and region. The prominence in these concepts suggests their feasibility as elements that would be most recommendable to developing globalization plans competitively (Bradmore & Smyrnios, 2009, p. 509). This led to the proposition by Bradmore and Smyrnios (2009) that the "Australian public universities are conscious of threats posed by rapid intensification of competition and are implementing strategies to protect market share and position" (p. 509). Bradmore and Smyrnios (2009) conclude that: