**Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency releases draft expectations for Australian universities**
Australia’s university regulator has said that higher education providers need to improve how they address student complaints and how they monitor interference by “external actors” on campus.
In a draft statement of regulatory expectations issued this month, the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency outlines changes it wants to see, including a “positive complaint management culture”, better promotion of grievance processes and better accessibility for international and special needs students.
Teqsa wants institutions to “proactively” work with at-risk groups during “periods of heightened tensions or stress”.
Under the draft expectations on complaints, providers will have to identify and remove any barriers to making complaints, and allow anonymous or confidential processes. Complainants will also have to be given full information about how the provider will investigate and deal with the complaint, and a written report must be provided at the end of the process.
Staff dealing with complaints will have to be trained in dealing with traumatised students and in identifying factors such as racism and gender and sexuality differences. Complaints staff will also need to be supported.
Teqsa’s proposed rules require regular reviews and publication of complaints processes, with student input, as well as regular analysis of the complaints being made. The draft foreshadows a public “reporting framework to be developed by Teqsa and the National Student Ombudsman”.
**More prescriptive**
The proposed expectations would be binding and would be more “prescriptive” than Teqsa’s usual “guidance notes”. While the new rules would apply to all higher education providers, Teqsa “is concerned that the greatest risk to students resides within universities, given the number of students they enrol and the complexity of their operations”.
Universities will have until the end of 2025 to comply, while other providers will have until June 2026.
Teqsa said it drafted the statement after considering “information provided to several parliamentary inquiries and parliamentary committee recommendations”, as well as direct consultation with the sector.
In a separate draft guidance note on external actors, Teqsa advised universities to update their policies and bylaws and to “develop productive relationships with outside agencies, such as state police or Australian federal police”.
Consultation on both papers closes on 27 March.
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