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February 3rd 2010 at 11:17am, By Dave Guerin
This post explains the backstory of the governance changes at ITPs, the second of a series on the issue. I agree with the changes taking place, which should improve sector performance.
Just before Xmas, the Government passed the Education (Polytechnic ) Amendment Act 2009, which will result in smaller Councils. Prior to that Act, all public tertiary education institutions (TEIs) had the same membership requirements:
Hmm, where to start…well, I’ll run thru a few problems with that set-up.
National looked at those reasons and others (including concerns about Council and ITP performance) and decided to cut Councils down in size. They started by suggesting 8 members, including 4 Ministerial appointees, the CEO, a staff rep, a student rep and a discretionary role. The Chair was also to be appointed by the Minister. After ITPs said that they wanted to ensure that Maori and others had a seat at the Council, the Government simply allowed Councils to determine who had the four non-Ministerial appointments. Roger Douglas apparently pushed strongly for this at the Select Committee. It was a smart political move, shifting the balancing decision to someone else, and making it a local decision.
The challenge for ITP Councils, and the Minister, is to get the right people onto Councils over the next few months, ready for the May 1 transition date. The rest of this series will look at the detailed issues – some great discussion has already occurred in the comments in the first post and I’ll draw on them.
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