In this episode of the podcast Claire is joined by Rishen Shekhar to discuss his experiences in the Australian international education sector and where it needs to head to next.

Here are links to some of the articles and reports Rishen discusses:

• Jon Chew 'Implications of rising inexplicable student visa rejections' https://thekoalanews.com/implications-of-rising-inexplicable-student-visa-rejections/IEAA Agent Quality Research Project: https://ieaa.org.au/IEAA/research/Publication/2026/IEAA-Agent-Quality-Research-Project.aspx
• Eric Knight 'Education agent commission ban won't cut course hopping. Here's what will: https://www.themandarin.com.au/308521-education-agent-commission-ban-wont-curb-course-hopping-heres-what-will/
• Minister directs French universities to raise fees for international students: https://monitor.icef.com/2026/04/france-directs-universities-to-charge-higher-tuition-fees-to-non-eu-students-starting-september-2026/
• Keri Ramirez 'Visa Cost Increase: The Quiet Rise of a $735 Million Revenue Stream' https://thekoalanews.com/visa-cost-increase-the-quiet-rise-of-a-735-million-revenue-stream/
• Universities Australia factsheet: https://universitiesaustralia.edu.au/publication/international-education-a-sector-worth-backing/

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire is joined by Prof. Kevin Ashford-Rowe, Pro Vice Chancellor Learning and Teaching at QUT and Dr Erin Jancauskas, Chief Academic and Partnerships Officer at Online Education Services (OES) to discuss how we can assure learning and encourage aspiration as AI transforms teaching and learning. 

In the episode they discuss the following reports and articles:

• OES - Assurance of Learning Positioning Paper
• Needed Now in Learning and Teaching - 'When teachers become builders: Vibe coding and the future of educational technology' - James Bedford, UNSW College
• The Castlereagh Statement - A cross sector call to action on Australian education and training in the age of AI

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire is joined by three senior leaders at the Analytics Institute of Australia (Pankaj Goel, Sarthak Goel and Rolf Baum) to learn about what it's like leading an international private higher education provider as the sector goes through a number of policy changes, as well as educating and preparing students for work in an AI-era.

During the interview - Sarthak references TEQSA's new Revised Academic Integrity Toolkit: https://www.teqsa.gov.au/about-us/news-and-events/latest-news/revised-academic-integrity-toolkit-now-available

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire is joined by the CEO of Canberra Institute of Technology, Dr Margot McNeill, to discuss some of the key reforms in VET including:

• TAFE Centres of Excellence
• National Qualifications Reform
• the National TAFE Network 
• women in leadership, and
• why we need to shift from RPL to "recognition of prior experience".

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode Claire is joined by Prof. Michael Wesley, Deputy Vice Chancellor Global, Culture and Engagement at the University of Melbourne to hear his views on what's happening in Australian higher education from both a domestic and international perspective.

In her introduction to the episode Claire briefly reflects on the recent Senate Committee hearing into the legislation to introduce the new Australian Tertiary Education Commission. If you're interested you can view a full replay of the hearing on the Senate's You Tube channel.

And if you're interested in the University of Melbourne's submission on the ATEC legislation, or any of the other submissions, you can find them on the Senate website.

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire unpacks all of the submissions to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee's inquiry into the "Universities Accord (Australian Tertiary Education Commission) Bill 2025 and a related bill".

If you want to read any of the submissions you'll find them on the Senate website: https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Education_and_Employment/ATEC2025/Submissions  

Also in this podcast episode Claire shares a few details (much more to come) on two big new initiatives she'll be launching this year - one focussed on VET data and the other on AI.

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire shares insights from three recent events she's attended:

1. GITEX Global where she learned about: the Canadian government's approach to "sovereignty not solitude" in an era of AI, and Canada's LLM (Cohere), the new Open University of Kenya, Estonia's successful digital economy, the UAE's LLM (Falcon), the Abu Dhabi government's TAMM app, G42's Global AI Institute with Microsoft, Abu Dhabi's Technology Innovation Institute, and the UAE's Mohamed bin Zayed University of AI (and here's the IMF's ratings of countries by GDP per capita)
2. National Summit on AI and the Future of Australian Education - if you're not familiar with the Australian Framework for Generative AI in Schools it's making a big difference in the schools sector
3. Digital Education Council's Global Summit - the chart that DEC CEO Alessandro Di Lullo shared "the scariest chart in the world" from Derek Thompson writer at The Atlantic (using data from the US Federal Reserve), DEC's Ten Dimension AI Readiness Framework. Danny Bielik spoke with Claire in Episode 117 of the podcast and Prof. Himanshu Rai joined Claire in Episode 122 

And details of The Economist's upcoming AI Innovation Asia summit.

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire is joined by Distinguished Prof. Keith Dowding and Dr Marija Taflaga from the Australian National University - with some answers to the problems of university governance.

In the episode you'll here references to:

• the paper Dr Taflaga, Dr Markham and Prof Dowding recently published: https://doi.org/10.25911/MWW4-9781
• their submission to the Senate Inquiry into University Governance is submission number 6 on the new Senate inquiry website: https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Education_and_Employment/UniversityGovernance48/Submissions
• the Senate inquiry's interim report has helped focus public attention on how significant some of the problems are in universities - it's at: https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Education_and_Employment/UniversityGovernance48/Interim_report
• the University Chancellors Council's submission to the Accord Panel's Interim Report is at: https://www.education.gov.au/system/files/2023-08/AUA_inter_tranche3_043%20University%20Chancellors%20Council.pdf
• in a much earlier episode of the podcast (episode 130) I summarised the submissions made to the first iteration of the inquiry (before the election). Those submissions are available at: https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Education_and_Employment/UniversityGovernance/Submissions
• in episode 132 I spoke to Prof. Renée Leon on university governance and the Charles Sturt University submission
• in episode 135 I spoke to Prof. Gavin Nicholson about his submission on university governance, and
• in episode 137 I spoke with Dr Julia Anaf about the health impacts on university staff of the current governance problems in much of the sector. 

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode, Claire is joined by by Bala Subra, TAFE NSW IT Program Development and Management to discuss their use of a new AI tool, Maya, as a team teacher supporting student learning.

In the episode Claire refers to the following resources which listeners working in the VET sector will find particularly useful if you haven't come across them before:

• TEQSA's GenAI knowledge hub: https://www.teqsa.gov.au/guides-resources/higher-education-good-practice-hub/gen-ai-knowledge-hub
• Claire's interview with Timmy Theopelus on Gen AI and a tech company getting engaged in VET: What Now? What Next? episode 109 
• Claire's recap of the 2024 HolonIQ Summit where Prof. Rose Luckin spoke about AI: What now? What next? episode 113

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode Claire is joined by Shae McGregor, Pathways Course Transitions Manager at TAFE Gippsland to discuss some phenomenal work they are doing to help learners experiencing intersectional disadvantage to make profound changes to their lives.

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au

In this episode of the podcast Claire is joined by the Vice Chancellor of the University of New England, Prof. Chris Moran to discuss the work UNE is doing to engage and support students from less privileged backgrounds to consider university study and find a place at UNE despite many not having an ATAR.

During the conversation Claire referred to this new report from Jobs and Skills Australia: https://www.jobsandskills.gov.au/research/studies/gender-economic-equality-study#paper2educationand

Contact Claire:

• Connect with me on LinkedIn: Claire Field
• Follow me on Bluesky: @clairefield.bsky.social 
• Check out the news pages on my website: clairefield.com.au
• Email me at: [email protected] 

The ‘What now? What next?’ podcast recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as Australia’s traditional custodians. In the spirit of reconciliation we are proud to recommend John Briggs Consulting as a leader in Reconciliation and Indigenous engagement. To find out more go to www.johnbriggs.net.au