Major institutional reforms approved in ‘secret meeting’

The governing body of the University of Sydney voted to shrink its number of faculties from 16 to six and cut elected positions from its senate in what critics have called a "secret meeting" late last year, writes Angela Lavoipierre for ABC.

The changes were voted on in the last meeting of the year for the University of Sydney senate, when many students had left for the break and others were engrossed in exams. Even some of the senate's members, known as fellows, had gone on leave, and one had recently passed away.

Several major changes were passed, among them, an extensive restructure of the faculties and changes to the senate itself. The particulars of the restructure have not been announced, but Michael Thomson, president of the University of Sydney Branch of the National Tertiary Education Union, compared it to the so-called Melbourne model, which led to job cuts at Melbourne University.
Full report on the ABC site