IHEA Submission | Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Consultation Paper on Interim Guidance: Managing External Actors

The interim guidance has been prepared in response to protests and encampments on campus that “multiple universities” experienced in 2024 and informed by learnings from a series of social cohesion roundtables, including with university vice chancellors on 21 October 2024 and university managers on 15 November 2024, which TEQSA organised and hosted.
At these roundtables, senior university representatives and other stakeholders shared their experiences of protests and encampments on campuses in Australia and the challenges associated with these events, including identifying and managing external actors. The guidance is also informed by relevant submissions to recent parliamentary inquiries.
While the experiences and focus of this guidance has been at/for universities, TEQSA is “encouraging all higher education providers to consider this emerging practice, giving appropriate consideration to all risks relevant to the institution’s particular circumstances and ensuring steps are taken to protect student and staff wellbeing and safety.”
From an IHEA perspective, our 86 members, include 5 independent universities, with the remainder being non-university higher education providers. Some providers will have campuses at which protests and encampments will be possible, however, for many it will not occur because of the layout or location of the campus.
While the material provided by TEQSA is guidance for managing external actors, as opposed to forming part of its regulatory processes, in considering how providers consider and implement the guidance, TEQSA needs to take account of providers’ size and scale, resources and likelihood of protests and encampments from external actors. TEQSA should undertake its own risk assessment with respect to each provider and develop commensurate, risk-based guidance that respond to the challenges a provider is facing, rather than adopting a one size fits all response based on the most significant and concerning experiences of particular universities.
Furthermore, it may be appropriate to attempt to define “external actors” to provide clarity around who is included and who is not. As there have been concerns about people who are not connected with a university participating in protests and encampments on campus, the applicability of the guidance could be strengthened by defining external actors as people who are not affiliated with the university in any employment or studying capacity. The university will have greater authority to act in relation to the conduct of its staff and students so being clear about external actors being parties not associated with the core function of people who work and study on the campus may be beneficial.
TEQSA also encourages providers to consider other relevant recommendations from forthcoming reviews, including internal reviews by individual institutions, the Australian Human Rights Commission’s study into the prevalence and impact of racism in Australian universities and work by the special envoys to combat antisemitism and Islamophobia.
It will be import in finalising the guidance that TEQSA takes account of other processes and ensures that they provide guidance that is streamlined but relevant to the provider and their operations and risk profile.
TEQSA will consider feedback with the aim of publishing the final guidance materials in April 2025.