Statement from NZITP

The majority of New Zealand’s 16 Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics are committed to supporting the Government’ s consultation and co-design process for the future state of the sector.

In response to recent political and media commentary on the Review of Vocational Education, NZITP said that its members are actively and positively involved in consultation on the Government’s proposals.

“The consultation involves detailed workshops and meetings in Wellington and visits to individual institutions. While we all agree that the short time frame is challenging, these meetings are going well,” said spokesperson Charles Finny.

“While there is much more work to be done the majority of NZITP Chief Executives see the potential for designing a system and structure for vocational education which will achieve even better results for our learners than the current model. We are fully committed to creating a model that creates seamless, consistent and integrated pathways between on and off job study, part time and full time study, and on-line and face- to-face study.

However, the sector still has strong reservations about aspects of the proposed single institution model. We are working with officials to ensure that there are well-defined and enforceable decision-making rights for regional providers. Further, we continue to advocate for an appropriately funded system that supports both the social and economic goals of communities and industry.

“The sector has for some years been calling for improvements to the system which would see a new funding model and much closer collaboration with businesses/employers, industry training organisations, and the secondary school system. This RoVE process potentially allows for the delivery of a more student centric outcome.”

Mr Finny said that while there has been debate on the centralisation of some functions, the NZITP CEO’s have been working for some time on collaborative models with a particular focus on reducing duplication and enhancing delivery.

“NZITP considers that this process has the potential to deliver an outcome that achieves much closer collaboration at a national level, however the balance between central and regional decision-making is crucial to success, as is the quality of the governance of any new institute,” he said.

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