The Elephant In The Room of Male Education: AUT Male Enrolments and Graduations In Decline

The NZR studies data from Victoria and AUT and finds that like Otago, men are at the centre of financial woes besetting 3 of the country's higher learning institutions. This article focuses on AUT.

Source: AUT advertisement

Student data provided by AUT, Victoria, Ara, UC and Otago follows the same general trend. Less men are graduating than women and less men are seeking to fulfil their aspirations through our tertiary institutions.

In March 2022, Radio NZ reported that the Auckland University of Technology would slash 170 jobs to slash costs. AUT’s then vice chancellor attributed revenue pressures to a drop in domestic and international enrolments.

Pictured: AUT vice-chancellor, Damon Salesa.

“McCormack said the strong employment market and the threat of disruption from omicron had dented domestic enrolments.”

“In addition, fewer young people had left schools in the university's traditional catchment area with university entrance.”

“ ‘Principals have told us that a lot of the students just gave up, it was too difficult. Schools obviously did everything they could but it was just a very difficult situation towards the end of the year with exam preparation and all of those final things that you need to do to catch up,’ McCormack said.”

But in 2024, do these reasons hold true and is there an elephant in the room that might hold the key to its decline and potential salvation for AUT and other tertiary institutions up and down the country?

Even after legal action forced AUT to restart its redundancy process, under Damon Salesa, the new vice-chancellor, it was still determined to cut jobs and costs. And for a good reason.

If the situation was dire in 2022 for AUT, fast forward to 2024 and its predicament had worsened.

Source: AUT