Imagine how many local businesses would be affected if our UNE became, largely, an online university. Hundreds of students and UNE staff would no longer be here to spend dollars.
Many locals would lose jobs as a result of this – in local businesses or at the University.
There would be many empty houses because students and most staff would not need to live here.
Since teaching staff would be likely to end up working from home, most of the University infrastructure would become redundant. This means that very little building maintenance would be required. Local tradespeople would suffer. There’s also a huge amount of supplies required to run a university. These supplies would not need to be purchased.
The decreased number of students on campus would be a deterrent for students to enrol as internal students. Of course, online teaching is the way to go when people prefer to study externally or insufficient students enrol in a particular course.
Many would miss the cultural diversity our dynamic university gives our community.
J Drewitt
