No price too high to remedy education system which fails to educate a workforce.(News)

BYLINE: Nan Yeld

ISSUES relating to higher education admissions have been much in the news recently, with headlines reporting that first-year students are not even able to read and write, and (less sensationally) the results of the National Benchmark Tests Project reveal real challenges in the areas of academic literacy, quantitative literacy, and mathematics.

In addition, the new minister of higher education and training has raised concerns about low participation rates in higher education, the exclusion of certain groups, skewed demographics in student bodies, and low throughput at a time of great need for an educated workforce.

Three issues at least need urgent attention if we are to address the admissions-related challenges implicit in these concerns.

First, we need to find out more about what students entering higher …