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[totoro]

I just got asked this and though it was worth doing a post on it. Here are some broad level differences:

1. Almost all state universities (apart from Bond U). The Go8 is equivalent to R1 roughly. Pay for a given grade is about the same at all universities and disciplines. Some market premia for some disciplines like business and law.

2. Don't really have a liberal arts model. Students apply to study in specific disciplines. So you'd mostly be teaching "majors" in your discipline.

3. Grants are smaller than in the US probably. Lots of grad students are on very good government scholarships though.

4. Relative to population we have far more foreign students than the US. We have more Chinese students than the US does with 1/15th of the population of the US.

5. Undergrad degrees are 3 years but you can then do a one year "honours" program. In some disciplines this is mostly coursework, in others a one year research thesis.

6. PhD programs mostly don't have coursework. In economics we do though but not as extensive as in the US.

7. There isn't a tenure system as in the US. Usually you are appointed to a "continuing position" with often a "probationary period" of 2-3 years. If you do OK you will likely be confirmed in position. When you are ready you can seek promotion from lecturer to senior lecturer etc. In theory you could be fired any time but in reality it is very hard to fire academics who do their teaching etc.

8. There are four academic ranks: lecturer, senior lecturer, associate professor (or reader sometimes), professor. The last two ranks are equivalent to professor in the US.

Please post more differences and/or tell me if you think these are wrong.

[nuff_said]

I'd also add that many PhD students in humanities and social sciences do not do a Masters. You can go from Honours straight into a PhD if the Honours has a significant research component (i.e. thesis), and your received better than X grade for your Honours year. Something like 75 or 80 at most places.

There are also differences in teaching terminology and classifications.  PhD students typically tutor in courses, which means they run discussion groups. In sciences they run labs.  I think adjucting is the same as casual lecturing in Australia. It's not a given that PhD students will have opportunities to deliver (lecture) a whole course. Usually there's an element of luck/opportunity involved. 

If someone can do a good comparison of these types of labels I think that could be useful.
 

[totoro]

Yes TA = Tutor and Adjunct = Casual or Sessional lecturer. But there are also "associate lecturers" here who are on the same payscale as post-doc fellows (level A) and seem to usually be PhD students. Most courses in humanities and social sciences have a lecture and a tutorial. Sometimes the lecturer does both and sometimes a separate tutor does the tutorials.

You don't have to do a masters to do a PhD in the US either but you do need to do coursework in both cases. You need to do more if you don't have a masters.

[juleb]

Three months ago, I posted here about the addressing criteria when applying to Australian universities.  I'm happy to report that I was offered (and accepted!) the position at a Go8 university, and I will be moving just after the new year.  I defended my PhD already, and I will start at Level B (lecturer).

Differences that I've noticed:

1. The use of a grades/payscales.  Much more straightforward than the US and (it seems) generous for those in humanities and social sciences.

2. Option for a 457 visa and relevant tax breaks for the first three to four years of my appointment.

3. No tenure system.  Coming from a cut-throat program where I saw several brilliant professors denied tenure, this is honestly quite a relief.  I'm an active scholar and dedicated teacher, and I expect to seek promotion when I am ready.

4. Courses in humanties/social sciences seem to have a lecture and a tutorial/workshop.  A different model from my PhD-institution that had discussion-based classes (typically 20-30 students at the undergrad and grad levels).

5. Lack of PhD coursework.  Again, this is a substantial difference from my PhD institution where a Masters required two years of coursework and a PhD required three years of coursework.  I found many of those courses to be instrumental in my development as a scholar, and I'm curious as to how this differs in Australia.

6. Instead of a US model of a PhD defense with four to five professors from your own university and perhaps an outside reader, it seems like theses in Australia are sent to the advisor and then several scholars from other universities to read and comment on.  Not sure how the format/length/revision time compare though.

Anything else I should know, coming from the US to Australia?

[totoro]

Three months ago, I posted here about the addressing criteria when applying to Australian universities.  I'm happy to report that I was offered (and accepted!) the position at a Go8 university, and I will be moving just after the new year.  I defended my PhD already, and I will start at Level B (lecturer).

Congratulations!

1. The use of a grades/payscales.  Much more straightforward than the US and (it seems) generous for those in humanities and social sciences.

Some US state universities use pay scales and/or the salary is publicly available.

2. Option for a 457 visa and relevant tax breaks for the first three to four years of my appointment.

As I understand it, there is only a tax break on non-Australian income. Be very careful though if you again leave Australia about holding on to your superannuation fund!

http://moominhouse.blogspot.com/2008/08/good-news-for-temporary-residents.html

3. No tenure system.  Coming from a cut-throat program where I saw several brilliant professors denied tenure, this is honestly quite a relief.  I'm an active scholar and dedicated teacher, and I expect to seek promotion when I am ready.

As I mentioned, there is probation, but it is generally easy to pass..

5. Lack of PhD coursework.  Again, this is a substantial difference from my PhD institution where a Masters required two years of coursework and a PhD required three years of coursework.  I found many of those courses to be instrumental in my development as a scholar, and I'm curious as to how this differs in Australia.

Undergrads are more specialized in Australia than in the US so they need less further coursework. And then they do honours/masters which depending on field could be more coursework. The top programs in my field (econ) in Australia do have PhD coursework. But it is at most one year. Unless you are specialising on an Australia or Asia/Pacific topic a US PhD in econ is still generally considered superior.

6. Instead of a US model of a PhD defense with four to five professors from your own university and perhaps an outside reader, it seems like theses in Australia are sent to the advisor and then several scholars from other universities to read and comment on.  Not sure how the format/length/revision time compare though.

Yes, we follow the British model of "external examination". Your advisers are not your examiners. This is similar to the general British separation of powers between Queen and Prime Minister, Chairman of the Board and CEO etc. Americans seem less concerned about concentrated power though they make a big fuss about "separation of powers". I think it is a pity that we don't do a regular defence or viva here. In the UK I think they do, but mostly we use foreign examiners and they're not going to be coming to Australia and so no defence. In the age of Ed Dante and video-conferencing, I think this should be rethought.

Anything else I should know, coming from the US to Australia?

You can apply to become a citizen 4 years after you arrive. This is much quicker than the US path to citizenship. This is great for people (like my wife) who are not citizens of Western/developed countries and want to be.

There are far more foreign students here than in the US.

It's expensive. Salary might seem high at current exchange rates... The only place I've been on recent travel that was more expensive was Denmark. I went to Sweden, Switzerland, Paris too on that trip. They all seemed comparable to Australia. Unless you are talking fresh fruit and vegetables of course. I feel that there is a lot "price dispersion" here. You can often get something much cheaper by shopping around. House prices in large cities here are comparable to NY and San Francisco at current exchange rates. Eastern Sydney to Santa Barbara. Adelaide is a bit cheaper than the other metros.

Ask and I'll try to answer!

[ochreluna13]

I'm attempting to revive a thread in order to learn more about the differences between the US and Australian higher ed systems.  Anyone with some insights please post.

[totoro]

Please ask me some questions about what you'd like to know.

[cogdoc]

If I may take up totoro's kind offer...

Have you ever been to Canberra? What do you think of it as a place to live? Any comparable cities in Europe, UK, or US?

[ochreluna13]

I'm interested in how folks from the US are viewed in the academic environment?  Are there different expectations / perceptions in your experience?

[totoro]

I live in Canberra (total 10 years living here). It can't think of one place that it could compare to best. Population is about 400,000, for me that is a nice size city without any of the problems like congestion, pollution etc of large cities, on the other hand many people find that too small. When I was single living here before I didn't like it for that reason and it is also very spread out - planned sprawl. This means it is pretty with lots of nature reserves, parks, hills between the neighborhoods but even the city centre is not that big. The general appearance etc. is what you'd expect for a city that size somewhere in California, Oregon etc.

It's inland and 600m above sea level with mountains rising to 1900m to the west. Climate is probably best reproduced in the US in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada in California. It's much milder than Reno or Santa Fe etc. in winter but similar to them in summer but gets quite a lot of summer rain recently.

It's supposedly the most Anglo-Celtic of the "capital cities" but still pretty multicultural - mainly Asian. Really, if you come from California you'd feel pretty much at home minus Spanish. Costco even recently opened here! :)

The cost of living is high but that is true of all major cities in Australia at current exchange rates. House prices average in the low $500k's but if you want to live anywhere near the centre $600-800k is more like it for a house and $400k plus for a 2 bed apartment. Rents are about $450 per week for 2 beds in the inner suburbs - rental market is still very tight. If you are willing to commute more than you can get lower prices but no houses under $400k. Tax levels in Aus are similar to CA/NY too.

The federal government does dominate the town but employs a smaller percentage of the workforce than some people think. You need to be a citizen to work for them. The ACT government will employ non-citizens as will the Universities (2 main ones), and CSIRO (government lab). Lots of firms and organizations that provide services to the Federal government (e.g. SAP, Oracle) or lobby the government (have offices here). If you are in any kind of policy-related academic field it is a great place to be. There is a lot of interaction with government. Because they are much smaller than the US federal government they are much more accessible and need input.

On the culture side there is the National Museum, Art Galleries etc. theatre etc. Of course, it isn't far to Sydney (about 3 hour drive, 270km - freeway the whole way). The coast is 160km and about 2 1/2 hours (not freeway at all).

[totoro]

I'm interested in how folks from the US are viewed in the academic environment?  Are there different expectations / perceptions in your experience?

We like people with PhDs from good US universities (any R1 university is good here). A lot of the US PhDs here are Australians of course who studied there (like me) and people from everywhere else in the world who studied in the US. Some places may have suspicions that US people will come and then spend their whole time trying to get back to the US and leave as soon as they can. But that isn't actually my experience and not our consideration, but people have told me that they think that.

[ochreluna13]

Thanks.  What can you tell me about UniSuper?  Is it just a retirement account or is there more I need to understand?

[totoro]

UniSuper is a fund manager that is the usual default for retirement accounts like TIAA-CREF in the US. They have both defined benefit and defined contribution (called "accumulation"). Retirement accounts are called superannuation accounts, or just "super", in Australia. The usual model at universities is for the employer to pay a total of 17% on top of your stated salary into super. The default is that you pay 7% of your stated salary as well into super (employee contribution). You can get out of that bit. The system is really complicated due to many changes in taxation regimes etc. over time. But basically, the money is taxed at 15% going in (rather than your marginal tax rate). It's taxed at 15% (or lower rates) while in the fund and once you retire and start taking money out there is no tax any more on earnings. So it is neither a 403b or a Roth in the US system but a hybrid. You can't get the money out till you are 60 if you were born after 1964. Not a question of penalties and tax like in the US, you really can't get it (though there may be exceptions for rolling over to an equivalent account in another country or for hardship). If you are only here temporarily you must be careful that the tax office doesn't try to grab your money when you leave. A few years ago they tried to grab temporary residents money while they were still here.

[ochreluna13]

Excellent explanation, thank you so much!