Welcome back everyone!

You’ll notice a few differences in 2012, including a transition to a new design look for ED Blog and ED Insider. Please excuse some slow site loading and a few design tweaks that will occur over the next two weeks.

Policy, Management & People

1. Destiny University? Destiny Church is planning a new campus (in the broad sense of the word) in Auckland that may incorporate a university (TVNZ, TV3, RNZ). The RNZ article should have a health warning as it has 2 big errors: that a private university would need CUAP approval for programmes and that International Pacific College is a university now. I’ll publish a post at 11am about the options for Destiny.
2. PEI Funding Cuts Practical Education Institute in New Plymouth may have lost up to 80% of its funding due to a poor course completion rate in its main course.
   They are having a staff meeting today to announce next steps – up to 60 jobs could be at risk.
3. Student Bar Canterbury’s student bar has had its foundations laid, despite opposition from parents of the school next door.
4. Extras: Bay of Plenty Poly kaumatua retires; CPIT is staying largely closed until Wed while it checks out buildings after recent quakes.

Research & Innovation

1. Kids’ Playgrounds Otago Uni’s Robin Quigg has found that kids don’t need fancy new playgrounds to stay active.
2. Extras: Victoria student gets dune research award; up and coming writers, several with links to Victoria; Auckland’s Prof Siah Ang on Auckland tourism.

Public Issues

1. Being Positive Fairfax asked 50 Kiwis about what they were optimistic about in 2012 – a few have tertiary links but why not read the lot? If this is your first day back, no-one really expects you to be hard at work J
2. Tolkien’s Nobel Victoria’s Prof Harry Ricketts comments on Tolkien being turned down for a Nobel Prize for Literature in place of Ivo Andric – I actually have books from both in my library, but did find the Andric book hard going (hmm, I may even have tossed it out).
3. Nude Swimmers Auckland’s Darrell Turner on nudists and moral panic in Auckland.
4. ICT Challenges Otago Uni’s Brendan McCane comments on the biggest challenges for ICT in 2012.
5. Extras: Victoria’s Prof Phil Lester on killing Argentine ants; Otago Poly’s Jo Wakelin on stonecrop; more penguins at Massey after Rena spills; Otago Uni’s Brian Cox on breast-screening; Canterbury’s Timothy Rowe on empathy.

Students

1. Ballooning Deaths The young couple who died in the ballooning accident seem to have studied at Massey, with one also studying at Victoria.
2. Extras: Victoria student off on a ship; Massey vet students’ calendar; group of American students here on an NZ experience; AUT student’s water bottle artwork on tour.