Universities Australia's modelling estimates higher education institutions are set to lose between $3.1 billion and $4.8 billion in revenue this year alone.
Professor Frank Larkins, former Deputy Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Melbourne says Monash, RMIT, UTS, La Trobe, Central Queensland, Southern Cross, and Canberra universities are most at risk, with all but La Trobe generating more than 30 per cent of their revenue from international student fees.
"If a university was to lose the research income from overseas students, that we predict, and it's, it's basically 40 per cent of the income across this whole year"
Professor Larkins says universities will have to take drastic action to cut their annual expenses if they are to balance their budgets, including reviewing the number of courses on offer and assessing the viability of multiple campuses.
Deakin University is one of the educational institutions planning for hundreds of redundancies. Catriona Jackson says universities are looking at cuts to jobs as an absolute last resort.
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