ACSES Policy Symposium kicks off with release of Equity Insights 2026 report

Dear colleagues,

The Australian Centre for Student Equity and Success (ACSES) has today released its premier annual publication, Equity Insights 2026, showcasing the leading voices who are shaping policy and practice across the higher education sector.

This year’s edition includes 16 contributions from thought-leading practitioners, researchers, policymakers, and students, with a focus on the evolving higher education landscape and how governments and institutions can redesign systems for success.

Equity Insights brings together diverse voices, evidence, and lived experience, with a view to better understanding the realities facing underrepresented and disadvantaged students—and using that understanding to inform meaningful change.

It examines the widening set of demands today’s students must navigate, including cost-of-living pressures, family and caring responsibilities, food insecurity, racial discrimination, and mental health and wellbeing difficulties.

The publication comes at a moment of major reform for the sector, with the establishment of the Australian Tertiary Education Commission and the introduction of the Federal Government’s Needs-based Funding system.

These changes offer Australia’s higher education sector a rare opportunity to redesign how it supports students.

However, as several contributions make clear, this opportunity will only be realised if universities, government, and regulators act in concert—and if the sector is honest about the extent to which its own systems, cultures, and assumptions contribute to the pressures students face.

Equity Insights 2026 includes contributions from Karen Nelson, Claire Field, Luke Sheehy, Patrick Broman, Jesse Parmar, Kerri-Lee Krause, Jacinta King, Giridharan Sivaraman, Sarah Bendall, Natalie Nelmes, Brooke Szucs, Jonathan Bullen, Braden Hill, Josh Mason, Michelle Trudgett, Susan Page, Lauren Tynan, Matt Brett, Alison Knapp, and Tyrone Carlin.

Its release coincides with ACSES’s two-day Policy Symposium 2026, which commenced in Brisbane this morning, with the report set to inform panel discussions around this year’s theme of "The Evolving Student in Higher Education".

You can now read the full report here: Equity Insights 2026: Understanding student realities and redesigning systems for success - ACSES.

Kind regards,

Professor Ian Li SFHEA
Research and Policy Program Director
Australian Centre for Student Equity and Success

Livestream registration still open | ACSES Policy Symposium 2026

The ACSES Policy Symposium 2026 is officially underway—but you can still register for the livestream of this crucial two-day gathering to advance equity in higher education.

Held on 8–9 September in Brisbane, the Symposium brings together national leaders and stakeholders in tertiary education including executives, policymakers, experts, and diverse student voices.

This year’s theme, "The Evolving Student in Higher Education", will spur conversations on how the profile, needs, and experiences of students are changing—across study modes, life stages, identities, and economic context—and what this means for policy, practice, and funding in Australian higher education.

The program features influential speakers from across the sector, as well as the ACSES Awards for Innovation and Excellence in Impact on Higher Education Policy and Practice 2026.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to hear from the sector’s leading voices on how to make higher learning more attainable for all Australians.

📆 8–9 September 2026
🕒 8.30am – 5.00pm AEST
🔗 Register for livestream here

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