Abstract:

National systems of tertiary and higher education are widely recognised as important assets contributing to the economic, political and social wellbeing of societies. New Zealand’s tertiary education system is unwell. Symptoms of the malady include the observation that the country has a relatively low level of tertiary education in the population as measured by the OECD. The system shows features of sustained inequality and even during periods of high employment salaries for educated people are low by international standards. The challenges facing tertiary education systems such as that in New Zealand are driven by long term trends that have worsened over the last few decades and which are apparent in other national systems struggling to enact effective policy frameworks for tertiary education. This paper analyses the structural challenges facing the New Zealand tertiary education system. It describes the development of a capability improvement framework designed to respond to these challenges based on the capability maturity model of organisational development. It describes the factors driving the pilot implementation of this framework by a national government agency and the application of the framework to a sample of tertiary education providers. The paper analyses the practical challenges of enacting tertiary system change using a tool like the capability framework, as well as the ongoing political, social and economic factors affecting the policy direction, choices and investments needed to evolve and sustain a national system of tertiary education. It reflects on the events that shaped the system politically and demonstrates the challenges facing agencies, policy experts and institutional leadership in responding to the demands made of a national system of tertiary education in other than a short-term and reactive way.

Keywords:

Tertiary education, capability maturity model, organisational change.