In the area of research, they are:
It is essential to retain (and to develop where they do not
adequately exist) research skills in areas that will enable
these aspirations to be realised. Some of the areas will be
problem-specific, but others will be generic. The latter
encompass fields such as mathematics (including statistics).
It will serve Australia poorly if we focus on building
specific problem-solving skills at the expense of the more
generic, enabling-science skills that underpin them.
There is, of course, a fundamental and explicit linkage
between education and research, which must be addressed when
discussing Australia's research aspirations. For example,
the same researchers in mathematical statistics, who advise
Australia's governments on how to analyse their data, also
train students for careers in those governments (see point
3 below). The training they offer generally draws
substantially on their research. At a more mundane level,
the capacity of university staff to undertake research depends partly
on their teaching load (see point 7).
Therefore, our capacity for realising Australia's research
aspirations is linked inextricably to that for realising our
aspirations for high-level teaching and training. The
importance of this connection will recur throughout this
submission. Priority areas for higher education and for
university research cannot be disjoint.
Aspirations for research and education are commonly
considered together in other countries, too. Indeed, one of
the reasons for designating a research area to be of priority
is that one hopes to attract quality teachers to that field.
The US National Science foundation, which in 2003 will commit
US$5 billion to fund a range of initiatives across all
areas of science, has strengthened this connection still
further by designating "learning for the 21st century
workforce" to be a priority area in its own right. (For a
list of other NSF priority areas, see point 6 below.) In
this context the NSF, which is known almost solely for its
support of very high-level research, draws the connection to
"learning" right down to the school level, not just to
university education.
There are other connections, too, between research and
education. For example, quality university research is an
excellent advertisement for quality university education,
especially when Australia is endeavouring to export the
latter. Our reputation as a country with high standards
in higher education is inevitably falling
as our research calibre and research profile decline.
Mathematics is both the currency and the language of
contemporary advances in science and technology. It lies
at the heart even of good governance, and there (as in many
other fields in Australia) it is in jeopardy. For example,
university-based mathematical statistics researchers, who
once advised the Australian Bureau of Statistics on its
methodology, and who trained statisticians for careers in
industry and government, have left this country to pursue
their careers abroad. They have not been replaced.
Australia's production of statistics graduates has plummeted,
to such an extent that the ABS (along with state governments,
industry and the CSIRO) now finds it extremely difficult
to recruit the trained mathematicians it needs.
The necessary response is surely obvious: Australia must
reverse this decline, and in particular must take steps
that will lead to increasing our nation's research skills
in the generic, enabling science of mathematics, which
underpins our performance in areas ranging from good
governance to developing innovative science and technology.
Identifying our needs for high-level training produces
essentially the same result. We must appoint and retain
university staff who are strong and active researchers in
the mathematical sciences, in order to supply higher
education and research skills in a wide range of fields of
critical importance to Australia.
The framework and selection criteria must devote substantial
attention to the generic, enabling-science skills that
underpin methodologies for solving specific problems in
important contemporary areas, for example in bioinformatics
and information & communications technology. They must also
sustain technological advances in more conventional settings,
for example in methodology for statistical analysis of data
on the Australian economy and community. Mathematics lies
at the heart of all these fields, and indeed of most modern
innovation, yet our research strengths in mathematics, and
our ability to train a new generation of researchers there,
are in marked decline. Over seven years, the number of
mathematicians in our universities has dropped by 30%; in
ten years, the number of Australian departments of statistics
has fallen from eight to three.
In short, mathematics (including statistics) must be a
priority in any framework for setting and implementing
national research directions. Moreover, for the reasons
argued in the response to point 2 above, mathematics
should
be a priority area for teaching and training, as well as
for research.
Mathematics is fundamentally important to several of the
social sciences, in particular to economics. In
international terms Australia is an under-achiever in the
latter field, not least because of the decline of our
contribution to the more theoretical areas of economics,
including econometrics. In short, giving priority to
mathematics will enhance regrowth in critical areas of
the social sciences.
Other nations are keenly aware of the massive contributions
that mathematics can make to their futures, appreciating
that mathematics is critical to expanding their economies
and ensuring their security. For example, the US National
Science Foundation (NSF) has recently begun supporting
mathematics at a level which is quite unprecedented in the
Foundation's 51-year history. It is growing its financial
commitment to mathematics by 20 to 25% annually, to meet
"a vital need for mathematicians and statisticians to
collaborate with engineers and scientists," to quote the
NSF. In particular, the NSF has declared the mathematical
sciences to be a single priority area. (The NSF has five
other priority areas: biocomplexity in the environment,
information technology, nanoscale science and engineering,
learning for the 21st century workforce, and social,
behavioral and economic sciences.) This provides strong
endorsement of the proposal made earlier in this submission,
that the critical enabling science of mathematics should be
given the status of a research priority area in Australia.
In countries such as the US the demand for mathematicians is
so great that it can be met in only a very minor way through
domestic training programs. The only means of overcoming the
shortfall is to attract many mathematicians from abroad, for
example from Australia. This compounds the difficulties here
that have already been created by long-term cuts in university
budgets for mathematics, and by the disappearance of
departments of statistics (and mathematics), across Australia.
We are suffering a continual outflow of our best
mathematicians, ranging from senior and experienced
researchers to outstanding new graduates, who are taking
attractive positions overseas.
It is essential that excellent researchers in priority areas
be given more time for research, in the form of relief from
escalating teaching and administrative loads, and from the
increasingly burdensome task of raising funding (for both
teaching and research). Without this, the high rate of
departures for posts abroad, and the low rate of entry into
research careers in Australia, will continue. Therefore, it
is necessary to:
In particular, achieving
research priorities in universities requires better support
for university teaching. See point 2 above for further
discussion of this linkage.
It is necessary too to increase the level of funding given
to promising young researchers in priority areas, in order to
encourage them to embark on research-oriented careers in
Australia. Therefore, it is essential to:
Poor support for research is just one reason
we are losing so many of our best young people to positions
abroad. See point 6 above.
Finally, and by no means least:
Peter Hall (Chair, National Committee for Mathematics)
(11/7/02)