Radio New Zealand - Te Reo Irirangi o Aotearoa

Performance figures unfair, say tertiary institutions

Updated at 7:44 pm on 17 August 2010

Tertiary institutions say Government league tables of their completion rates will be unfair.

They say the figures, due at the end of August, will be over-simplified and encourage people to compare totally different institutions.

It is well known in tertiary education circles that institutions with many part-time, extra-mural or second-chance students have lower pass rates than those that do not.

But all that will be lost in the Government's new league tables.

Though the tables will include figures for different types of qualification, the headline results will be a single course completion rate and a single qualification completion rate for each institution.

Tertiary education leaders believe that is too simplistic and say the Government should drop the aggregated figures and provide data that is more meaningful for prospective students.

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