This review was asked to examine Australia’s higher education system and create a long-term plan for reform. To be successful, these reforms will require a large investment from the Australian Government and a major contribution from higher education providers.

But a central tenet of the review is that all parts of Australia’s education system need to work together to meet Australia’s future skills challenge. Education in the early years and through the school system delivers the student body required to grow the higher education system. Growth in higher education needs to be paired with similar growth in vocational education and training (VET), which will be an essential part of Australia’s skills mix into the future. Where possible, the review – and this report – focuses on tertiary education, seeing higher education and VET as 2 important parts of the same system, each bringing different strengths.

The review proposes ambitious targets to increase the number of places in the tertiary education system to meet Australia’s skills needs. This includes:

• lifting the tertiary attainment rate of the working age population (people with at least one Certificate III qualification or higher) from 60% currently to at least 80% by 2050
• increasing the proportion of university educated Australians aged 25 to 34 from 45% currently to 55% by 2050 – to achieve this increase, the system will more than double the number of Commonwealth supported students in universities from 860,000 currently to 1.8 million by 2050
• a strong and growing contribution to tertiary attainment driven by TAFE and the vocational system, with a planning assumption that 40% of 25 to 34-year-olds will have a tertiary level vocational or technical qualification in 2050, noting that some people have both a VET and higher education qualification
• opportunities for lifelong learning for all Australians to reskill and upskill, driven by national targets for tertiary participation and attainment across the working age population developed with the states and territories through a stewardship approach similar to that agreed in the 2023 National Skills Agreement.

The review recognises that achieving these targets will require both the higher education and VET sectors to grow substantially as well as work more closely together. Increasing participation and attainment is not just about what people do during the career-building momentum of the post-school years, but throughout their working lives as they return to education to reskill and upskill.

The summary report outlines themes and issues identified in the final report.