A theological college has been anointed as Australia’s 44th university following a successful appeal against the sector regulator.
The Australian College of Theology (ACT) – now the Australian University of Theology (AUT) – becomes the third religious institution to be elevated to full university status in recent years, following the Seventh-day Adventist-affiliated Avondale University and Melbourne-headquartered University of Divinity in 2021.
AUT’s registration as a university was announced by the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency on 8 January following a decision by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal last October.
The tribunal overturned Teqsa’s refusal of several applications for ACT to achieve university status, ruling that the institution conducted the required level of “world standard” research, and dismissing the regulator’s case that such scholarship was confined to a small group of staff.
The institution was founded in 1891 by the Church of England in Australia and Tasmania, but has catered to other denominations since the 1960s.
It gained university college status in 2023 and now has about 3,000 students enrolled in courses in theology, ministry and Christian studies across 16 partner colleges which span Australia.
Roger Lewis, chair of AUT’s board, said that the university was “well placed to meet the growing interest in the spiritual dimension of life, especially among younger Australians”.
“A basic principle of what distinguishes an Australian university from other higher education institutions is that it undertakes research at world standard. We are delighted that ACT has been recognised for its world-standard research in theology,” Revd Dr Lewis said.
The decision means that religious-based institutions are driving a significant chunk of change in a higher education landscape which went through almost two decades without any new universities being created.
Following the University of Divinity’s elevation to be a fully fledged university, it added several additional colleges to its own federation, and said it was eyeing a new role as a professional educator for carers, teachers and nurses.
Moore Theological College and Alphacrucis College have in recent years gained university college status, a category that was largely dormant until Avondale achieved it in 2019.
And in 2020 the University of Notre Dame Australia, a private Catholic institution in Perth, was given access to government subsidies for domestic undergraduate places.
Religious universities will need to maintain their focus on research to retain their newly won status, with Teqsa standards requiring universities to conduct research at world standard or better in at least half the broad fields of education in which they teach.
That benchmark must be achieved within 10 years. In the meantime, new universities must conduct world-standard research in at least 30 per cent of their educational fields.
However, they can expect more resources to help with this. Although university status does not confer any right to government research funding, all universities have in the past been given access to research funding schemes.
AUT said it would seek to be recognised in legislation that will allow it to access research infrastructure funding.
The development comes as Australia’s leading Catholic university faces significant challenges, amid an apparent power struggle among the archbishops at the helm of its corporation.
The Archbishop of Sydney, Anthony Fisher, resigned as chair of the Australian Catholic University (ACU) Committee of Identity, saying the institution’s treatment of former union leader and conservative Catholic Joe de Bruyn constituted “cancel culture at its ugliest”.
Mr de Bruyn was subjected to what Archbishop Fisher believes was an orchestrated walkout of students and staff during his October speech accepting an honorary doctorate at an ACU graduation ceremony. Mr de Bruyn had outlined his history of opposition to abortion, in vitro fertilisation, same-sex marriage and Catholics who “cave in to peer pressure”.
