of youth programmes available in our
communities. These contracts help us gain
access to the people who really need our
help – those whose needs haven’t been
met at secondary school and who would
benefit most from tertiary study. We also
created a wide range of programmes to
engage youth, including a number of joint
ventures to support Māori and non-Māori
tauira at other institutions.
Riding a new wave of change
Budget 2012 provided detail around the
Government’s adjustment to the way it
purchases our foundation programmes
at level 1 and 2. Within the new regime,
the Government placed 33.3% of
its 2013 level 1 and 2 funding into a
contestable pool. This move posed (and
continues to pose) a significant threat
to our organisation – it has the potential
to seriously destabilise our wānanga
and removes any certainty surrounding
our short and long-term planning. It also
seriously threatens the ongoing viability
of our organisation. On this occasion our
application to the contestable fund was
successful and we secured funding for all
programmes for which we bid. As things
stand, we will go through this process
again in 2014. However, we believe a
co-constructed alternative developed by
ourselves and Government will be a better
way to fully realise our contribution to the
Government’s national education goals.
The Government’s current drive for
economic transformation is increasingly
limiting our organisation’s ability to fulfil
our distinctive character as defined in
the Education Act 1989 – ‘to assist the
application of knowledge regarding
āhuatanga Māori according to tikanga
Māori’. Pressure to achieve unrealistic
performance outcomes creates an
institutional shift that compromises the
Annual report 2012
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