La Trobe on Wednesday announced it would cut an estimated 200 full-time positions across its campuses. The university was yet to confirm how many of those jobs were in Bendigo.

La Trobe Casuals Network member Pan Karanikolas said the cuts were "pretty devastating" for staff.

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"This will lead to increasing casualisation," Mx Karanikolas said. "Casuals have been excluded from this process - a lot of us have not been invited to the school or department meetings following the all staff forums.

"The university has not been transparent about what they're doing. We stand with our colleagues across all the universities in fighting this."

A La Trobe spokesperson on Wednesday said the proposal was about ensuring La Trobe was in a strong position for future growth.

"It will secure our financial position in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, which continues to have major implications for the finances and operations of all universities across Australia," the university statement said.

"Our campus in Bendigo will continue to play an important role in the social, cultural and economic prosperity of the city."

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Mx Karanikolas said the series of job cuts at the university in the past 18 months had led to increasing workloads for the staff who were left.

"Especially when COVID hit last year, people were expected to adapt and go online," they said. "There was a lot of unpaid work in doing that, particularly for the academic staff.

"People are already at breaking point with the amount of work they have and, especially for casuals, a lot of that work is unpaid."

Mx Karanikolas said the Casuals Network was meeting next week to form a plan of action for staff.

They conceded that job cuts and increasing casualisation of the workforce was not a unique problem for La Trobe.

"It's definitely sector-wide," Mx Karanikolas said. "Casualisation has been affecting universities for a long time."

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