The prospect of university degrees more than doubling in cost came as news to would-be students attending Saturday's open day for two of Sydney's biggest universities.
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And only one thing seemed certain about the potential fee rises when the University of Sydney and the University of Technology opened their doors: students looking at individual courses were not going to get much detail from the universities themselves.
The federal government introduced legislation this week to cut funding for university courses and give universities the power to set their own fees.
Communications students at the University of Sydney would face a hike in the cost of the course from about $18,000 to $37,000 from 2016 onwards, under previously published Fairfax Media analysis.
"I didn't realise the jump could be of that size," said year 12 student Kellie Tang, who is considering a degree in communications and was one of an estimated 20,000 to attend the open day.
"I think they definitely should have talked about it," said Madeleine Rudder. "You can do a lot of [communications] subjects in [a general] arts degree, so you would have to think twice if an alternative is going to cost less."
Experts warn that, if passed, the policy could double - or even triple – the cost of degrees at prestigious universities, particularly in disciplines such as communications, environmental science and engineering.
The proposed fee rises would take effect from 2016 or the second year of a degree for students applying this year.
"Parents and prospective students are understandably keen for clarity about the situation from 2016," said the Vice Chancellor of the University, Dr Michael Spence.
Dr Spence would not say when information about fee rises would be provided to potential students but said the University would increase its academic scholarships if the government's deregulation policy passed the Senate.
There is no positive indication that it will. Labor, the Greens and all but two of the eight crossbench Senators say they oppose the policy.
But the National Union of Students said universities could still be playing a more open hand despite political uncertainty.
"University is a massive financial undertaking," said Deanna Taylor, the NUS President. "Particularly on open days for a university to not disclose that there may be very large fee increases halfway through a course is disingenuous and misleading.
"Universities would have [calculated] how much they would need to increase their fees if funding is cut."
Eighteen-year-old Matthew Cole was tossing up between UTS' nursing and architecture courses and said while the prospect of fee rises should have been mentioned, they were unlikely to influence his choice.
A spokesman for UTS said that while fee information was not provided in course briefings, the University had set up a stall with information about fees.
