The Rise of Australasia

Hearing Minister Kailo’s proposal, Arthur nodded and said with great emphasis, "Building universities is essential, as education is the key to a country’s strength. Minister Kailo, how many universities does our country currently have?"

"Your Majesty, we currently have 47 universities, and every year we can train over 45,000 university student talents," Minister Kailo hastily replied.

As the economy of Australasia rapidly developed, the number of universities also continuously increased.

However, the number of universities and the annual number of university graduates still did not meet Arthur’s expectations, especially when compared to those established powerful nations, the prevalence of higher education in Australasia was still too low.

Yet, considering Australasia’s population of less than 30 million, the annual graduation numbers of 45,000 university students had already exceeded expectations.

At least in current-day Australasia, a university degree, although valuable, was no longer so rare.

University graduates were commonly seen in many positions, and the number of degree holders in Australasia was at least 700,000, plus all the students currently enrolled; university students constituted at least 2.8% of the total population.

"What do you think of the proposal to build the Saint Arthur Castle branch of the National University and the Saint Arthur Castle School of Agriculture?" Arthur looked towards the other Cabinet members and asked with a smile.

Under Arthur’s strong advocacy, Australasia placed a high importance on education, with annual educational funding accounting for about 18% to 19% of the Total Fiscal Expenditure.

Based on last year’s enormous 200 million Total Fiscal Expenditure, the fiscal spending on education was over 37 million AUD.

With such premises, when Arthur asked about the proposal to build two universities, no one expressed any opposition; all were supportive.

Arthur nodded and immediately announced, "Minister Kailo, the task of building the Saint Arthur Castle branch of the National University and the Saint Arthur Castle School of Agriculture is entrusted to you. As our capital, the construction of these two universities in Saint Arthur Castle is vital.

We must strictly control the sources of teachers, and we should hire many renowned experts from Europe and America to serve in the schools.

The Royal Science Academy will assist you with the construction of the laboratories for these two schools. The candidate for the president of the National University’s Saint Arthur Castle branch can be chosen from the Royal Science Academy, while for the School of Agriculture, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Agriculture should consult."

The National University’s specialties were comprehensive, but it was mainly known for physics and chemistry, which was also related to the shortage of talents in these fields in Australasia at that time.

For this reason, the president of the National University could be chosen from the Royal Science Academy, where the experts were entirely adequate, both in rank and ability.

As for the candidate for the president of the School of Agriculture, it would depend on whether the Ministry of Agriculture had the relevant talent.

Currently, schools of agriculture in Australasia were quite scarce. If Arthur remembered correctly, among the 47 universities, agriculture, arts, and language were the least represented, right?

There seemed to be only two or three agricultural universities. Arts schools were slightly better, but their number probably did not exceed four. Language schools, due to the unified language plan, were the most numerous of these three categories, but there were only five.

Compared to the schools specializing in physics and chemistry, which numbered over a dozen, these types of schools were indeed few.

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