I studied part-time online at the University of Southern Queensland for five years, and my overall experience has been deeply disappointing. I have never had such zero effort from any business I’ve bought an expensive service from.
Response times are extremely long in every department, there is no real support for online learners. The fees are exorbitant considering all lectures are online, and yet many lecturers seemed unprepared or unable to answer basic questions about course content. Casual staff have no idea of content and admit to being vague. Some didn’t even record their lectures, making it impossible to review material later.
Administrative staff were often rude and unhelpful, and the entire system felt disorganised, even the placement department and end-of-course graduation processes which should be well-oiled machines. I even had to PAY for a completion letter as weeks later, I still don’t have a graduation certificate that I missed a job opportunity because of. No one knows what’s going on, passed from department to department with everyone confused about their roles. I’m now being forced to wait six months for my graduation ceremony simply because a casual staff member submitted my final marks late and the cut off date was passed.
USQ feels like a university focused solely on collecting fees rather than providing service, learning or support. There is no sense of care for students, only endless bureaucracy. I would not recommend this university to anyone, a very large waste of money. Don’t even ask about the handbook saga…

It’s the worst experience not to be able to understand a lecturer who speaks English at an Australian Uni! The reason I withdrew was that I could not understand any lecturers in my course. I usually am fine with accents, but these were bad recordings and mumblers, which made it impossible to understand. They did not provide captions or transcripts, and it got to the point that I couldn’t understand the content, as it was technical and not just regular speech. It is very sad that an Australian cannot understand multiple lecturers at an Australian University (all except one of mine were Indian). The degrees are great for their flexibility, but when you pay to learn nothing, it’s really a hard pill to swallow. One I chose to withdraw from, as after a year I was still struggling badly, along wth many others. They will pass you no matter what (you would have to be absolutely failing to not get a pass) to make up for the lack of understanding due to language. I reported several times, and the degree coordinator (also Indian) said it was just how it is. This is not my first degree, and this is definitely not how it normally is.