Benchmarking for archaeology honours degrees in Australian universities

A bachelor degree with honours in archaeology is still seen as the fundamental level of academic achievementrequired to gain entry to the profession and to higher degree research in archaeology in Australia. This is despite therecent proliferation of other kinds of similar university awards, such as specialist diplomas and coursework mastersprograms. A comparison of the content and standards of honours degrees currently offered by Australian universitiessuggests variation in the threshold standards, the contents and the grading systems used. Considering our commonbelief in the role of the degree we think that it is now time to introduce standardisation and benchmarking practices, such as those implemented in British universities.