Australia’s new public university aims to challenge traditional education

A new public university being set up in Australia aims to overhaul traditional tertiary education by teaching artificial intelligence (AI) as a core skill underpinning all courses.

Students will also be free to decide and organise the microcredentials to fit into their degree requirements and go through an apprenticeship-focused education that better aligns their skills to industry needs.

Adelaide University, which will launch in January 2026, is the result of a merger between two public universities, University of Adelaide and University of South Australia.

The new university seeks to differentiate itself through a “rigorous [re-]design” of the university curriculum into what it termed the Adelaide Attainment Model.

Speaking to GovInsider, Adelaide University’s curriculum leads Professor Joanne Cys and Professor Katrina Falkner shared why this new university is breaking out of the mould, and achieve “scale” with a new curriculum architecture.

AI for both educators and students

Not only will AI be taught in all courses beyond technology-related ones, educators will also leverage AI to personalise learning pathways for students.

“The new learning management system will provide a rich digital environment for prospective students.

“We’re very interested in using AI to help support our [educator] colleagues in preparing for new courses and helping them understand how to engage with students,” said Prof Falkner.

Through the data gathered from the online learning experiences of students, educators will be able to find out how they can improve to better engage students in their learning.

It is a two-way empowerment process, she added, as students can also access the data to find out about the effectiveness of their learning.

“It is about taking the data and AI to make it part of the partnership between the educators and students to deliver education,” she said.

Adelaide is set to be at the forefront of advancing AI in Australia. Earlier this year, national news platform 9News recently reported that the South Australian government will be investing  A$12 million (US$8.0 million) into the research and translation of AI.

According to an international education information portal, the other courses that make up the new university’s common core curriculum include Australian Aboriginal knowledge, design thinking, entrepreneurship, ethics, and cultural knowledge.

Microcredentials the way forward

Microcredentials and learning modules are typically associated with professional development and executive education courses. But Prof Cys shared that the flexibility for such courses can be applied in the undergraduate setting as well.

Traditionally, if an undergraduate student is unable to fulfill all their course requirements, they may have to wait a semester or even a year to repeat the course. “That’s not helping them to progress through their studies,” she said.

In the new university, students have the option to take the courses either in full flight, or stack them based on their individual interests and needs.

The increasing number of students enrolling into universities will not only consist of school leavers, but working adults who also want to upskill. “So, we want provide as much flexibility in attaining these qualifications,” she added.

“We wanted to recognise the changing nature of contemporary learners, all of their responsibilities and the pressures they have.”

Rather than “reacting” to these emerging needs of the student cohort, the university administrators want to create a curriculum that is supportive of flexibility and accessibility, she said.

GovInsider recently covered a Singapore university’s approach to deliver its bachelor's degree programme through a stackable, microcredential pathway.

Better aligning education to industry needs

The new university will be partnering the industry to co-develop the curriculum and incorporate more of an apprenticeship element, considering the rapidly evolving needs of the industry.

Prof Cys said that the team is working closely with industry accreditation and advisory bodies to develop the curriculum to ensure that they are relevant to the national workforce's needs.

Industry partner organisations will also be located within the campus to expose students to practical, real-world industry experience as early and as much as possible.

Prof Cys said that the apprenticeship element was inspired by UK’s higher and degree apprenticeships, where students are working and learning at the same time.

“They [the universities in the UK] do a lot of work and partnerships to integrate with employers and industry partners to make sure that learning is relevant and immersive for students,” she explained.

On one hand, students are gaining industry-relevant experience as they learn. On the other hand, industry organisations are already investing and shaping the upskilling needed by their future workforce by partnering with the university.

The new university targets to launch with 70,000 local and overseas students by 2026.