NZs Offshore Public Tertiary Education Programmes

Over recent years there has been a significant increase in New Zealand's public tertiary providers' involvement in offshore activities. The Government's Export Education Strategy foreshadowed further work by the Ministry of Education on policy issues surrounding the growth of offshore education programmes offered by New Zealand providers. An initial stocktake of offshore activity by New Zealand's public tertiary providers has been completed and an analysis of results is outlined in the report below.

Historical comparisons

28. In 1998, the Ministry commissioned a stocktake of internationalisation strategies in New Zealand tertiary institutions based on 1997 data[1]. Offshore education did not make up a major part of the 1997 stocktake. However, the stocktake did find that six tertiary institutions maintained offshore campuses or twinning programmes. Four offshore programmes were in Malaysia and two in Australia. In 1997, there were 380 students enrolled in these offshore programmes.

29. We can see rapid growth in the provision of offshore programmes by public tertiary providers in the last few years - from six providers involved in 1997 to 17 in 2001, and from 380 student enrolments in 1997 to an estimated 2,200 in 2001.


[1] Internationalisation and Tertiary Education Institutions in New Zealand, Ken Back, Dorothy Davis & Alan Olsen, IDP Education Australia (for the New Zealand Ministry of Education), June 1998.



Content last updated: 20 August 2008