Beyond Performance: A Call for Living Systems in the Wake of the Universities Accord

Synopsis:
This article offers a grounded response to the Australian Universities Accord Final Report, exploring how its promises of equity, Indigenous leadership, and structural reform might take root in practice. Drawing on decades of work across academic and community systems, it argues that true transformation will require more than policy it calls for place-based investment, relational governance, and a living-systems approach to knowledge.

Influenced by thinkers such as Tyson Yunkaporta, Arturo Escobar, bell hooks, Leanne Simpson, and Vandana Shiva, the piece outlines a framework of sixteen university futures and proposes an emergent vision of regenerative education. Written from the perspective of a designer-activist and farm-based educator, the article closes with a quiet call to begin prototyping a new kind of university one rooted in soil, story, and seasonal rhythm.