The Prime Minister told parliament in his scene-setting speech for the year this week that his government is building a more effective tertiary education system “that provides good value, high-quality up-skilling opportunities for New Zealanders from all walks of life”.  He later described the path to high quality as teaching record numbers of students on reduced funding.

During his speech Mr Key outlined the government’s priorities in tertiary education as progressing the Youth Guarantee policy and opening eight further Trades Academies.

“These will provide hundreds of students the opportunity to learn a trade in a school setting while also ensuring they have the foundation skills needed for future learning “.

Mr Key noted that the government would examine lower-level tertiary provision, such as that provided in level one and two certificate courses.

Mr Key also reiterated that there would be no significant new funding:

“Our focus is on getting better results from money in the existing budget for tertiary education and ploughing any savings into creating more places for students to take up education and training.”

Mr Key said there had been good progress so far, with universities this year set to provide record numbers of student places, and funding in place to allow for 16,500 additional places across the wider tertiary education sector, as compared to 2008.

The Government will continue work to build better value out of the interest-free student loan system, including considering further changes to encourage repayment by graduates living overseas.

Thanks to nznationalparty at Flickr for the photo