Background Briefing

In June 1999 the Mid West Development Commission held a youth forum to encourage young people between 18-30 years of age to become involved in regional development.

At that time the most important issue to emerge was lack of access to university education in the Mid West so a youth sub-committee was formed to see what could be done.

During 2000 the Geraldton University Access Group (GUAG) was formed and all WA universities were approached to offer courses in Geraldton. None would commit without the allocation of fully funded places from the Federal government.

In 2001 the Federal government did allocate 670 new university places and GUAG obtained $135,000 from the Higher Education Innovation Fund to establish an appropriate model for regional delivery.

In June 2001 a delegation from GUAG (Ms Lee Morton, Ms Felicity Mitchell & Mr Tony Brooker) travelled to Canberra with the support of the Hon Wilson Tuckey and lobbied the Federal government for a regional allocation of the new places. They also argued for a change in the system to give a degree of power to regional communities and to allow Geraldton rather than the universities to receive funding for regional places

The delegation was successful and set a national precedent by having university funding allocated for specified regional delivery. The University of Western Australia, Curtin University of Technology and Edith Cowen University formed a consortium to bid for the Geraldton university places, with the University of Western Australia taking the role of Administering University.

Community Success

In November 2001, after 2 ½ years of hard work and dedication by organisations and individuals in the Mid West, the Geraldton Universities Centre was established.

Six years after the initiating community meeting, the Mid West opened its own purpose built facility in Geraldton. The student body had grown from 20 student places in 2001 to 130 enrolled students undertaking a range of full degree programs by 2005. Course offerings continue to expand in line with burgeoning community interest, and the GUC is now well placed to offer support to external students as well.

“Individual experience … Community benefit” – the GUC catchphrase certainly captures the vision and foresight of that initial community meeting.
 

The formal opening of the Geraldton Universities Centre Building

The Geraldton Universities Centre was opened on 17 February 2006, by the Federal Member for O’Connor, The Honourable Wilson Tuckey MP, who unveiled a plaque to commemorate the event.