Undergraduate study

All undergraduate and honours degrees have Commonwealth supported places available, except the Associate Degree in Aviation (Professional Pilots) program, which is full-fee only. 

A CSP is a place at university where the tuition fee is jointly paid by you and the Commonwealth Government. Your share of the fee (student contribution) is set by the government and determined by the discipline areas (bands) of your individual enrolled courses (subjects), not the overall program.

To be eligible for a CSP you must be:

• an Australian citizen, or
• an Australian permanent visa holder or New Zealand citizen, and
• meet the relevant citizenship and residency requirements.

If you are an Australian citizen, you will meet the CSP residency requirements if you undertake at least some of your course of study in Australia.

If you are a permanent visa holder or a New Zealand citizen, you must be resident in Australia for the duration of your unit(s) to meet the CSP residency requirements.

A Commonwealth supported place (CSP) is a place at university where your tuition fee is jointly paid by you and the Australian Government.

Your share of the fee (student contribution) is set by the government on an annual basis and determined by the discipline areas (bands) of your individual enrolled courses (subjects), not the overall program. 

All undergraduate and honours degrees have Commonwealth supported places (CSPs) available, except the Associate Degree in Aviation (Professional Pilots) program, which is full-fee only. 

As a CSP student, you may be eligible to apply for a HECS-HELP loan, which can be used to defer payment of your student contribution to the Australian Tax Office up to your HELP limit.

Students who don't require an exact figure for their student contribution amount can estimate their contribution by assuming that all courses in their program will be from the same band and using the maximum student contribution for that band as their estimate, e.g. if a student is enrolled in an Accounting degree their approximate annual student contribution will be $11,155 in 2020.

Some programs, such as Double Degrees, may require students to enrol in more than a standard full-time load (96 credit points) in some or all years of the program. The annual student contribution can be determined by adding together the cost for each course undertaken in that year.

^ Effective Full-Time Student Load

Note:

*If you began your course of study prior to 1 January 2010 you may be considered a pre-2010 student. Pre-2010 students will be charged $5,348 per EFTSL for education and nursing courses (subjects) in 2020. Students who started their course of study on or after 1 January 2010 are subject to the band 1 student contribution amount specified in the above tables for education and nursing units.

^ Effective Full-Time Student Load

Note:

*If you began your course of study prior to 1 January 2010 you may be considered a pre-2010 student. Pre-2010 students will be charged $5,254 per EFTSL for education and nursing courses (subjects) in 2019. Students who started their course of study on or after 1 January 2010 are subject to the band 1 student contribution amount specified in the above tables for education and nursing units.

To determine the exact annual fee for a program, you need to know which courses you will be undertaking as well as the band and weight for each course.

• 2019 course list (PDF 5.8MB 181p)
• 2020 course list (PDF 5.7MB 180p)

To calculate an exact fee for a course, the student contribution is calculated by multiplying the EFTSL value of the course by the maximum student contribution for the band that the course has been allocated to. Your enrolment program structure shows which courses you need to complete to meet the academic requirements of your program. 

Example 1: student contribution for one course

A 12 credit point economics course has an EFTSL of 0.125 and is in Band 3. The 2020 student contribution for this course will be $1,394.00 (rounded down to the nearest dollar):

$11,155 x 0.125 = $1,394.00

Example 2: student contribution for multiple courses

A student commences a bachelor degree in 2020. In their first year, they enrol in eight courses of equal weighting (8 x 12 credit point courses), which comprise a standard full-time load (96 credit points). They enrol in five business courses and three arts courses. Their student contribution for 2020 would be calculated as follows:

* the fee for each course is rounded down to the nearest dollar

As a CSP student, you may be eligible to apply for a HECS-HELP loan, which can be used to defer payment of your student contribution to the Australian Tax Office up to your HELP limit

Don’t forget to include other fees such as the student services and amenities fee (SSAF) and materials fees to determine the overall costs. 

You may be eligible to apply to defer payment of the SSAF through the SA-HELP loan scheme.

If you are an Australian citizen or a permanent humanitarian visa holder enrolled in a CSP, and you meet the HECS-HELP eligibility criteria, you can apply for a HECS-HELP loan to defer payment of your student contribution.

If you are a permanent (non-humanitarian) visa holder, or a New Zealand citizen who does not meet the NZ SCV long-term residency requirements, you are not eligible for HECS-HELP. You must pay your student contributions upfront by the census date.

A full-fee place is a place at university that receives no financial contribution from the government. Fees cover the full cost of tuition and vary from program to program.

If you are enrolled in a full-fee place, you may be eligible to apply for a FEE-HELP loan, which you can use to defer payment of your tuition fees to the Australian Tax Office up to your HELP limit.

You will pay fees based upon the number of credit points you are enrolled in for your program and the fee-per-credit-point for that program in the current year.

Most programs at RMIT have a standard annual full-time load of 96 credit points, so you can estimate your expected tuition fee for the year by multiplying the fee-per-credit-point by 96.

You can also calculate the cost of any course in the same way. The list of courses offered by RMIT contains the credit point value for each course. The undergraduate and postgraduate full-fees list contains the fee per credit point for each program.

• 2019 course list (PDF 5.8MB 181p)
• 2020 course list (PDF 5.7MB 180p)
• 2019 domestic higher education full-fee tuition fees (PDF 460kb 18p)
• 2020 domestic higher education full-fee tuition fees (PDF 460kb 10p)

Example 1:

In 2019, a student will be enrolled full-time in BP295 Bachelor of Criminology and Psychology. To calculate the annual tuition fee for this program the student needs to multiply the number of credit points by the fee-per-credit-point as follows:

Example 2:

Some programs, such as double degrees, may require enrolment in more than 96 credit points in each year to enable students to complete the program in the allocated time. To calculate fees in these programs, students will need to know how many credit points are required in the year of their enrolment.

For example, in 2019 a student will be enrolled full-time in BP305 Bachelor of Science (Applied Science)/Bachelor of Business (Management). This is a double degree, requiring 432 credit points over four years. They enrol in 108 credit points in 2019. Their tuition fee for the year can be calculated as follows:

RMIT reserves the right to adjust tuition fees for full-fee places on an annual basis by an amount that will not exceed 7.5% each year (subject to rounding).

For higher education fees, tuition fees are rounded up to the nearest $10 per credit point increment, and so the actual fee increase may exceed 7.5%.

You may be eligible to apply for a FEE-HELP loan, which you can use to defer payment of your tuition fees to the Australian Tax Office up to your HELP limit.

Don’t forget to include other fees such as the student services and amenities fee (SSAF) and materials fees to determine the overall costs. 

You may be eligible to apply to defer payment of the SSAF through the SA-HELP loan scheme.

Most higher education programs at RMIT have a standard annual full-time load of 96 credit points that is equal to 1 EFTSL (Effective Full-time Student Load). Although there are some exceptions (such as double degrees, which may require a student to undertake more than the standard 96 credit points), this does not change the way EFTSL is calculated.

The EFTSL of any course can be determined by dividing its allocated credit points by 96. For example, a 12 credit point course has an EFTSL of 0.125 (12/96 = 0.125).

Below is a list of EFTSL values for the more common credit point values: