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The student perspective
Participation
Teghan O’Connor
Bachelor of Paramedicine
I'm the first in my family to go to university. Most of my family is, a lot of tradie backgrounds. And I'm hoping that some of my younger cousins will follow in my footsteps.
So in year twelve I chose the hardest subjects I could, just because obviously they increase your ATAR, so I was trying to aim for the best. I got sick. I ended up with a really bad ATAR.
So I wrote a letter to VU, I pretty much told them why I wanted to study the course, why I am passionate about the course and what I would do to achieve and get the best grades I can and further my career.
So VU made it very easy. As soon as you finish the diploma they'd offer you your conditional entry. You accept. You go straight into your degree and all the units that they recognise as prior learning are already taken off for your first year.
I'm really looking forward to being a paramedic on the streets, helping people in everyday need.
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Financing
Austin Crawley
Bachelor of Business (Human Resource) Management
So I grew up in Albury, which is located about four hours from Melbourne.
I had a gap year where I worked, I didn’t travel at all. I was lucky I had saved up. A lot of students from the country do have to apply for Austudy. So government - supported government grants - and that can be quite a tedious and stressful process, especially when you have to prove how much your parents earn. So making ends meet week to week can be very stressful and adds another level to your anxiety when you are just trying to focus on study.
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Job Readiness
Devendra Singh
Masters of Business Information Systems
So, somewhere if the university can involve a work experience or that sort of unit in the course outline that would be amazing. I can easily apply for an internship in some organisation for a six months period or so. But that practical internship will not be counted towards my unit.
I believe that I have, like, two things in my hand - my degree along with my extra-curriculars and whatever I have done other than degree. But for others, it's like they have just their degree in hand and there are thousands of people with degrees in their hands.
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Pathways
Michael Garang
Bachelor of Criminal Justice
I was born in Darfur. I left with my grandma before the war. All my siblings and family they all live back in South Sudan.
My teacher didn’t like my English - it was good but it wasn’t higher level. He recommended me to do some courses studies like in the TAFE at Victoria University. And that’s where I went and I did liberal arts for one year. And, from there, I decided, like, OK, should I continue to study or should I go to work?
I decided to continue and I did an Advanced Practice of Legal, a Diploma of Legal Studies. I did that for like one year and a half and, from there, I decided to do a Bachelor of Criminal Justice.
I was determined to be a police officer so that is why I decided that maybe if I do university I might be able to improve my English and then I would get, more likely chance to get into Victoria Police. My family are very proud of me of me because I am now about to graduate from university. They are very happy.
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Innovation
Jessica Almenara
Bachelor of Business (Marketing)
When I first moved over Melbourne I was unsure of the universities available to me so I did a bit of research and I did find Victoria University to be quite interesting because of the Block Mode.
The Block Mode is when you study one subject at a time, more intensely. That means you have the same lecturer, the same classroom, three times a week and that gives you that one-on-one engagement with the lecturer.
I think the block mode has definitely helped improve my grade from a D to and HD because I'm now able to be engaged at one subject at a time and focus on that without the three other subjects and their deadlines of those subjects pressuring me.
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My Ideal University
Austin Crawley
My ideal university of the future would be teaching people to work in diverse teams, in a key area of gender equality. I would hope in 10 years that that is reached.
Devendra Singh
Creating a balance between the theoretical part and the practical part. And introducing more of practical subjects or topics in the fields of artificial intelligence, or robotics, or something related to space.
Teghan O’Connor
I would like for universities to not to look at the ATAR as like the overall. I would like if they asked a student to write a personal letter to actually show why they're interested in that course and use that as well and not just the ATAR.
