Examining the fabric of academic life: An analysis of three decades of research on the perceptions of Australian academics about their roles.

Over the last three decades there have been numerous surveys in Australian universities which have attempted to describe the perceptions of academic staff to various aspects of their roles. Each of these surveys appears to have been inspired by changes resulting from contemporaneous government policies and/or community expectations. Calls for ’’Efficiency and Effectiveness‘‘, ’’Accountability‘‘, and ’’Quality and Diversity‘‘ have coincided with massive expansion in the higher education system, the change from a binary system to the Unified National System, and consequent changes to student profiles, funding arrangements, and academic workloads. Academic culture, with its tradition of freedom and autonomy, has been besieged by the alien culture of managerialism with its own vocabulary of ’’client‘‘, ’’quality assurance‘‘, and ’’product‘‘: but has this assault made any difference to how academics perceive their work and their perceptions of quality in university teaching ? This paper reports on an analysis of data (relating to academics‘ perceptions of their work) from surveys conducted in universities from the late 70s and throughout the 80s and 90s. The paper analyses, compares and contextualises academic perceptions across these decades, and draws some conclusions about the perseverence of academic culture under siege. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]