Summary

Experts warn the University of Technology Sydney’s plans to cut the School of Public Health undermines Australia’s willingness to act in future health crises. A UTS professor says the process surrounding the cuts felt designed to cause harm and stress to staff.

What's next: UTS School of Public Health is building a financial case to present to University leadership in a bid to continue.

A proposal by the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) to close its School of Public Health could undermine Australia’s ability to prepare for future health crises, including another pandemic, experts claim.

Leaders in the public health community say the closure will cut the future workforce pipeline into the interim Centre for Disease Control (CDC) and erode equity, hitting disadvantaged communities the hardest.

It comes as new research shows Australians are willing to accept tough health measures in cases of national health security risks, a turnaround from the government’s 2024 COVID-19 inquiry findings. UTS has proposed a major restructure to save $100 million through an Operational Sustainability Initiative (OSI) and put the university back into surplus. The controversial plan includes 400 potential job losses, 167 courses and 1,101 subjects discontinued, and cuts to nine schools. The School of Public Health is one of them.

Holly Donaldson, executive director at the Council of Academic Public Health Institutions Australasia (CAPHIA), described the proposal as “shortsighted”.

“Public health is often seen as the low hanging fruit because it is complex and not as easy to describe as physiotherapy,” she told Central News, adding that this often means public health degrees “don’t make money in the same way other courses do. Given the tightening fiscal environment and external pressures in the university sector, they look for an easy win to cut costs.

“But it is ultimately stealing health from our future selves, and especially for UTS, it risks their reputation.”

UTS’ announcement was released days before the University of Sydney published findings on the importance and acceptability of non-pharmaceutical interventions (a critical component of public health) in a national health crises such as COVID-19.

“The Government’s COVID inquiry said we need to assume public trust was broken and people wouldn’t endure non-pharmaceutical interventions like lockdowns, wearing masks or social distancing again, but we found the exact opposite,” said Emma Campbell, a Public Health research officer at University of Wollongong, who co-authored the report.

“People in the two cities – Sydney and Melbourne – with the most stringent lockdown conditions were more inclined to do it all again if they had to.

“But you need specific people with specially trained public health skills and expertise in behavioural science communication to help the public understand the risk to themselves and others in these situations.

“There would have been no point in creating a vaccine if no one was going to take it.”

We need more public health professionals, and we need a robust, diverse pipeline to respond, not just to the current challenges of today, but the emerging challenges of tomorrow.

Donaldson said UTS’s plan to cut the School of Public Health raised urgent concerns about the nation’s future workforce and the possibility of the loss of potential graduates weakening the pipeline feeding into Australia’s interim Centre for Disease Control (CDC) and national health infrastructure.

According to UTS’ most recent data, 297 students graduated from the school of Health in 2023. The same data was not included in the 2024 annual report. Donaldson warns the consequences of this decision extend beyond short term disruption.

She said the universities’ actions sent a clear message, signalling its compliance in undercutting Australia’s national health priorities, the ability to respond to the climate crisis, and preparations for future pandemics.

“There’s an interim CDC at the moment and we need more public health professionals, and we need a robust, diverse pipeline to respond, not just to the current challenges of today, but the emerging challenges of tomorrow,” Donaldson said.

Dr Albie Sharpe, a public health lecturer at UTS, believes the issue is deeper than the size of the future workforce and not simply a matter of students enrolling at another university. He said the school “attracts passionate students because of its positions on equity, from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds”.

“It’s vital, in terms of the core philosophies of public health, that we give students from different communities the opportunity to study and work for their communities,” he said.

Donaldson agreed, adding “we need the workforce to reflect the communities they serve [and] the UTS School of Public Health is deeply embedded in, and works closely with its communities”.

For graduates such as Campbell, who studied a Bachelor of Health Science (now known as Public Health) at UTS, the message is clear: “We are losing accessibility and competitiveness – it’s important to have diverse training in different institutions – otherwise we are projecting inequity.”

Graduates are not the only group struggling with the proposed cuts. UTS Staff were not given an opportunity to present a case for the future of the Bachelor and instead were only privy to rumours for months before any formal announcement was made, and a short consultation process begun.

“The process seemed designed to deliver the maximum amount of harm and stress to staff,” Sharpe said.

“Even though the university was warned that it was going to be in breach of SafeWork, it still went ahead, and then SafeWork had to step in.”

We have teachers coming from across Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific to talk about the best practice for public health education.

SafeWork NSW was called in to assess concerns about staff’s psychological wellbeing throughout the process, and found it lacking, ordering the university to pause job cuts for a period and institute remediation before continuing.

The National Tertiary Education Union has also questioned the data used to justify the closure, reporting that marking was not included in the assessment of workload allocations.

Sharpe said the data is “highly dubious” and described the entire experience as “heartbreaking”. However, he said he is confident the department is building a “strong financial case” to present to the university in a bid to continue.

While the proposed cuts will not take effect until 2026 and be implemented at the start of the academic year, in November 2025, the university is still set to host an international forum and a three-day student Hackathon in partnership with CAPHIA in November.

Donaldson said the university’s intention to promote itself as a leader on teaching public health while hosting the events was a “grand irony”, given UTS was selected due to its “innovative public health education.”

“We have teachers coming from across Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific to talk about the best practice for public health education,” she added.

As CAPHIA and UTS staff prepare for these events, the wider community is campaigning to ‘Save UTS Public Health’. A petition, which has garnered 1200 signatures, will be presented to UTS leadership.

UTS Vice-Chancellor, Andrew Parfitt, and the board declined to comment.

Disclaimer: The author of this story is a student at University of Technology Sydney. Central News is a website for journalism students of UTS, and the editor is an employee of UTS.

Main image courtesy UTS.