About

The Melbourne Free University provides a platform for learning, discussion and debate which is open to everyone. The MFU was established in 2010 in response to Australia’s increasingly outcome oriented education system, and aims to offer space for independent engagement with important contemporary ideas and issues.

The MFU runs six-week courses and once-off special sessions on a range of subjects and themes, with classes taking place on weekday evenings from 6.30-8pm in Melbourne’s inner north. Each session starts with a 45 minute presentation by an expert on the issue at hand, followed by a 45 minute participant-driven discussion. This is not a Q&A session – we believe that everyone has something important to bring to the discussion, regardless of their education, job, or experience, and hope to create a space where the community can come together to learn off one another and debate salient current issues.

All welcome. There is no enrolment, no registration, no fee; you are free to come to any session.

Our Principles

• The Free University combines the academic rigour of a traditional university with the open discussions of a philosophical salon.
  
• The Free University stands for radical equality: the a priori belief in universal equality and possibilities of emancipation.
  
• The Free University is free and accessible. It remains politically and economically autonomous from political parties and organisations, government, private bodies, universities and NGOs.
  
• The Free University is based on the belief that people have the responsibility to seek and engage with knowledge. Learning is an act of will and empowerment.
  
• The Free University is an alternative to the exclusive and outcome orientated education sector, enabling the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake, and thereby freedom.