Between application forms, sorting out your visa and dreading the epic flight across the world, getting organised to study abroad in Australia can be exhausting. Not to mention your apprehension at what kind of academic world awaits you once off the tarmac.

Australia’s higher education sector is comprised of both technical colleges and universities, offering technical, undergraduate (opens in a new window) and postgraduate (opens in a new window) qualifications. Institutions must be registered with a government body to offer places to international students. Thinking of studying abroad in Australia, but don’t know where to start? Let our breakdown of the Australian higher education system help make things more clear.

As well as offering undergraduate and postgraduate qualifications, there are a number of institutions offering programmes in vocational education. These institutions are called ‘colleges’ or TAFE: Technical and Further Education, and have different entry requirements to universities. Programmes on offer are typically employment-based or can act as a lead-in to a tertiary degree. Students should pursue individual entry requirements on institution websites.

Bachelor degrees in more focused study areas may sometimes take longer to complete, and have different options for majoring and minoring. Most universities have online handbooks that students are advised to consult for specific course advice and information.

Master’s degrees (opens in a new window), either by coursework or research are one-two years in length.

An Australian bachelor degree (opens in a new window) is typically a three-year study in a general area, within which students choose a specific area to focus on. This specific area is called their ‘major,’ and students will be required to complete a quota of subjects within it in order to be awarded the qualification. Students may also complete a set, lesser quota of subjects in another area to receive a ‘minor’ title, often taking the place of other electives students may choose. An example of a general degree would be a Bachelor of Arts (BA), in which a student could major in an arts discipline such as Psychology (opens in a new window), and minor in another such as linguistics. Some universities offer students the option to minor or take ‘breadth’ subjects from other faculties, information on which is course-specific and should be pursued directly with the institution.

Many universities also offer double degree programmes, in which students are able to undertake units from two different degrees at a time. As a result, double degrees are much longer than a standard undergraduate study.

Concurrent study programmes such as diplomas and certificates are also offered by some institutions, and provide students the chance to supplement their main studies with a study in another area. Students must meet credit requirements for both qualifications and so must spread their coursework over a longer period of time.

Students are expected to have researched the course requirements for both programmes, and take initiative in selecting courses with the relevant credit levels to meet both sets of requirements.

Australian universities expect students to take initiative and are focused on independent learning. Attending lectures is never mandatory and even tutorials can sometimes be optional: however, it is within your interest to go, and lecturers will expect you to be mature enough to make that decision for yourself. In lab-based and practical units however attendance requirement are much more stringent.

If you don’t hand in work on time, you’re penalised up to 10% of the grade you otherwise would have got per day. After a set cut-off point, you will automatically fail the unit. Tutors will not chase you up for missing work, but will sometimes give you the option to re-submit the work on a pass-fail basis. Coursework in arts disciplines is generally research based, and assessment will usually centre on a few, long-form pieces of work as opposed to intermittent quizzes and testing.

Plagiarism is considered a serious academic offence whose consequences can range from failing an assessment to expulsion from university. Students are strongly urged to familiarise themselves with faculty-specific referencing procedures before submitting coursework.