The University of Sydney (commonly referred to as Sydney University, Sydney Uni, USYD, or Sydney) is an Australian public research university in Sydney. Founded in 1850, it is Australia's first university and is regarded as one of its most prestigious, ranked as the 45th in world in the the QS World University Rankings and 56th in the world by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings in 2015-2016. Additionally, Sydney graduates have been ranked by QS Graduate Employment Rankings as the most employable in Australia and 14th most employable in the world.Five Nobel and two Crafoord laureates have been affiliated with the university as graduates and faculty.Its campus is ranked in the top 10 of the world's most beautiful universities by the British Daily Telegraph and The Huffington Post, spreading across the inner-city suburbs of Camperdown and Darlington.
The university comprises 16 faculties and schools, through which it offers bachelor, master and doctoral degrees. In 2011 it had 32,393 undergraduate and 16,627 graduate students.
Sydney University is a member of the prestigious Group of Eight, Academic Consortium 21, the Association of Pacific Rim Universities (APRU), the Association of Southeast Asian Institutions of Higher Learning, the Australia-Africa Universities Network (AAUN), the Association of Commonwealth Universities and the Worldwide Universities Network. The university is also colloquially known as one of Australia's sandstone universities.
In 1848, in the New South Wales Legislative Council, William Wentworth, a graduate of the University of Cambridge and Charles Nicholson, a medical graduate from the University of Edinburgh Medical School, proposed a plan to expand the existing Sydney College into a larger university. Wentworth argued that a state university was imperative for the growth of a society aspiring towards self-government, and that it would provide the opportunity for "the child of every class, to become great and useful in the destinies of his country".It would take two attempts on Wentworth's behalf, however, before the plan was finally adopted.
The university was established via the passage of the University of Sydney Act,on 24 September 1850 and was assented on 1 October 1850 by Sir Charles Fitzroy.Two years later, the university was inaugurated on 11 October 1852 in the Big Schoolroom of what is now Sydney Grammar School. The first principal was John Woolley,the first professor of chemistry and experimental physics was John Smith.On 27 February 1858 the university received its Royal Charter from Queen Victoria, giving degrees conferred by the university rank and recognition equal to those given by universities in the United Kingdom.By 1859, the university had moved to its current site in the Sydney suburb of Camperdown.
In 1858, the passage of the electoral act provided for the university to become a constituency for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as soon as there were 100 graduates of the university holding higher degrees eligible for candidacy. This seat in the Parliament of New South Wales was first filled in 1876, but was abolished in 1880 one year after its second member, Edmund Barton, who later became the first Prime Minister of Australia, was elected to the Legislative Assembly.
Most of the estate of John Henry Challis was bequeathed to the university, which received a sum of £200,000 in 1889. This was thanks in part due to William Montagu Manning (Chancellor 1878–95) who argued against the claims by British Tax Commissioners. The following year seven professorships were created: anatomy; zoology; engineering; history; law; logic and mental philosophy; and modern literature.
The New England University College was founded as part of the University of Sydney in 1938 and later separated in 1954 to become the University of New England.
During the late 1960s, the University of Sydney was at the centre of rows to introduce courses on Marxism and feminism at the major Australian universities. At one stage, newspaper reporters descended on the university to cover brawls, demonstrations, secret memos and a walk-out by David Armstrong, a respected philosopher who held the Challis Chair of Philosophy from 1959 to 1991, after students at one of his lectures openly demanded a course on feminism.The philosophy department split over the issue to become the Traditional and Modern Philosophy Department, headed by Armstrong and following a more traditional approach to philosophy, and the General Philosophy Department, which follows the French continental approach.
Under the terms of the Higher Education (Amalgamation) Act 1989 (NSW)the following bodies were incorporated into the university in 1990:
Sydney Branch of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music
Cumberland College of Health Sciences
Sydney College of the Arts of the Institute of the Arts
Sydney Institute of Education of the Sydney College of Advanced Education
Institute of Nursing Studies of the Sydney College of Advanced Education
Guild Centre of the Sydney College of Advanced Education.
Prior to 1981, the Sydney Institute of Education was the Sydney Teachers College.
The Orange Agricultural College (OAC) was originally transferred to the University of New England under the Act, but then transferred to the University of Sydney in 1994, as part of the reforms to the University of New England undertaken by the University of New England Act 1993 and the Southern Cross University Act 1993.In January 2005, the University of Sydney transferred the OAC to Charles Sturt University.
In 2001, the University of Sydney chancellor, Dame Leonie Kramer, was forced to resign by the university's governing body.In 2003, Nick Greiner, a former Premier of New South Wales, resigned from his position as chair of the university's Graduate School of Management because of academic protests against his simultaneous chairmanship of British American Tobacco (Australia). Subsequently, his wife, Kathryn Greiner, resigned in protest from the two positions she held at the university as chair of the Sydney Peace Foundation and a member of the executive council of the Research Institute for Asia and the Pacific.In 2005, the Public Service Association of New South Wales and the Community and Public Sector Union were in dispute with the university over a proposal to privatise security at the main campus (and the Cumberland campus).
In February 2007, the university agreed to acquire a portion of the land granted to St John's College to develop the Sydney Institute of Health and Medical Research. As a Roman Catholic institution, in handing over the land St John's placed limitations on the type of medical research which could be conducted on the premises, seeking to preserve the essence of the college's mission. This caused concern among some groups, who argued that it would interfere with scientific medical research. However, this was rejected by the university's administration because the building was not intended for this purpose and there were many other facilities in close proximity where such research could take place.
At the start of 2010, the university controversially adopted a new logo. It retains the same university arms, however it takes on a more modern look. There have been stylistic changes, the main one being the coat of arm's mantling, the shape of the escutcheon (shield), the removal of the motto scroll, and also others more subtle within the arms itself, such as the mane and fur of the lion, the number of lines in the open book and the colouration.The original Coat of Arms from 1857 continues to be used for ceremonial and other formal purposes, such as on testamurs.
Action initiated by Spence to improve the financial sustainability of the university has alienated some students and staff. In 2012, Spence led efforts to cut the university's expenditure to address the financial impact of a slowdown in international student enrolments across Australia. This included redundancies of a number of university staff and faculty, though some at the university argued that the institution should cut back on building programs instead.Critics argue the push for savings has been driven by managerial incompetence and indifference, fuelling industrial action during a round of enterprise bargaining in 2013 that also reflected widespread concerns about public funding for higher education.
An internal staff survey in 2012/13, which found widespread dissatisfaction with how the university is being managed.Asked to rate their level of agreement with a series of statements about the university, 19 per cent of those surveyed believed "change and innovation" were handled well by the university. In the survey, 75 per cent of university staff indicated senior executives were not listening to them, while only 22 per cent said change was handled well and 33 per cent said senior executives were good role models.
In the first week of semester, some staff passed a motion of no confidence in Spence because of concerns he was pushing staff to improve the budget while he received a performance bonus of $155,000 that took his total pay to $1 million, in the top 0.1 per cent of income earners in Australia.[Fairfax media reports Spence and other Uni bosses have salary packages worth ten times more than staff salaries and double that of the Prime Minister.
Concerns about public funding for higher education were reflected again in 2014 following the federal government's proposal to deregulate student fees. The university held a wide-ranging consultation process, which included a "town hall meeting" at the university's Great Hall 25 August 2014, where an audience of students, staff and alumni expressed deep concern about the government's plans and called on university leadership to lobby against the proposals.Spence took a leading position among Australian vice-chancellors in repeatedly calling throughout 2014 for any change to funding to not undermine equitable access to university while arguing for fee deregulation to raise course costs for the majority of higher education students.
During Spence's term, the university has attracted scorn for allowing students from an elite private school, Scots College, to enter university via a "pathway of privilege" by means of enrolling in a Diploma of Tertiary Preparation rather than meeting HSC entry requirements.The university charged students $12,000 to take the course and have since admitted a number of students to degree courses. Exposed by Fairfax media, the scheme has been criticised by Phillip Heath, the national chairman of the Association of Heads of independent schools of Australia.
An investigation by Fairfax Media in 2015 revealed widespread cheating at universities across NSW, including the University of Sydney.The university established a taskforce on academic misconduct in April 2015 to maintain its leadership position in preventing incidences of cheating and academic misconduct.
