The Australian Catholic University has spent $53 million in purchasing a North Sydney office tower as it prepares to up its student intake this year.

 

The ACU has purchased the tower, which is adjacent to its North Sydney campus, to use as a library, office space and as an area for its postgraduate students.

 

The acquisition is another step in ACU’s rapid expansion strategy that has seen student numbers increase from 14,500 in 2006 to an expected 22,000 by the end of the year across its New South Wales, Queensland and Victorian campuses.

 

The purchase of the office block comes as the ACU has started an $85 million building project in Melbourne.

 

Universities across Australia are preparing to adjust to significant structural reform of university placements which will allow institutions to dictate their own intake numbers, rather than fill a government-set placement number. The decision to change student intake laws was a response to the Bradley Report that was commissioned by the Federal Government in 2008.

 

The report can be found here