This is the very first of what will be fortnightly Education Action Group columns. The Education Action Group is the student group, initiated and supported by VUWSA, to engage students around education based issues and to run forums, campaigns and protests.
This trimester, the Education Action Group will be focusing on issues concerning tertiary education investment.
The recent Budget has seen cuts to tertiary education funding, and many adjustments made to the student loan system. Once again, it is another Government Budget that has sparked the philosophical debate: Is higher education a right or a privilege?
The Education Action Group is your student group to have this debate; it’s your student group to run campaigns around these issues, hold forums and protests.
The 1990s is a perfect example of a period which saw Education Action Groups, in conjunction with student associations, mobilising thousands of students up and down the country to protest against big changes made to the tertiary education system in New Zealand, such as the introduction of the student loan scheme.
Should the Government be charging interest on student loans? Should student allowances be universal? Is it reasonable for the Government to cut tertiary education to the level that the university is putting caps on course entrance, cutting tutorials and lectures?
“Education is a human right with immense power to transform. On its foundation rest the cornerstones of freedom, democracy and sustainable human development.” (Kofi Annan, 2001)”
“The educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living from the dead.”
(Aristotle)
After considering the words of these well known figures, should we be sitting by watching thousands of New Zealanders struggle to access tertiary education?
Should we be sitting by watching thousands of students struggle to get the best out of the education they have been fortunate to access because of the decline in the quality of education, as a result of the under investment of education in New Zealand?
Ultimately, is education a privilege or a right?
You decide.
James Sleep
VUWSA Education Officer
Education.Officer@vuwsa.org.nz
EAG Meeting details:
5pm on Wednesday 28th July in meeting room three, level two, Student Union Building.