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.
Methodology
6. The stocktake took place from December 2001 to February 2002. All New Zealand public tertiary education providers were surveyed - this includes four Colleges of Education, 21 polytechnics (or institutes of technology), eight universities, and three wananga. In some instances, a telephone conversation was adequate. In most instances, written questionnaires were sent to the International Student Director or equivalent at each institution (copy attached as Appendix A). The Chief Executive, Head of Academic Programmes or Pro-Vice Chancellor with responsibility for international education sometimes took responsibility for answering the questionnaire. Responses related to the 2001 academic year.
7. Larger Private Tertiary Establishments (PTEs) were initially questioned about their involvement in offshore delivery in 2001. Feedback was positive, but all in relation to `future plans'. For this reason, PTEs were not included in the initial stocktake.
8. Responses were received from all 36 public tertiary education providers. Some responses were incomplete and work will continue to follow-up the stocktake with respondents. Given the commercial sensitivity of some of the information requested during the initial stocktake, the identities and specific activities of individual providers are not discussed in this report.