University of Otago College of Education lecturer Lynn
Tozer passes out cake during a protest yesterday against
proposed job cuts. Behind students, Tertiary Education
Union national president Dr Tom Ryan, prepares to speak.
Photo by Linda Robertson.
Cutting cakes was used to draw attention to cutting jobs
yesterday as staff at the University of Otago College of
Education protested against proposed restructuring.
The university wants to restructure the college to increase
its proportion of "research active" staff, while cutting $1.3
million from the college budget, a figure it says covers what
the college requires in subsidies this year.
The cake stall was symbolic of raising the $1.3 million,
Tertiary Education Union southern organiser Kris Smith said.
Staff handed out slices of cake and protest pamphlets to
about 70 people gathered outside the college in Union St
during the short protest.
One pamphlet gave a "recipe for a half-baked teacher"
which included slicing curriculum content thinly, watering down
the arts, straining and discarding classroom expertise and
packing ingredients into a crowded lecture theatre.
"When finished, serve to your children and grandchildren,"
the recipe said.
The university plans to cut 27 positions by the end of 2012
and fill seven of those positions with people with different
skill sets.
The union says teacher educators - the academic staff who
teach student teachers professional practice - are being
targeted and the restructuring will result in poorer teacher
training programmes and produce teaching graduates who may
lack skills necessary to perform in the classroom.
At worst, the proposal would see half of the college's
teacher educators "sent down the road", Tertiary Education
Union national president Dr Tom Ryan said at the protest.
Some would say the "so-called restructuring was a
decimation", Dr Ryan said, rating the proposal "a C minus,
and that's pushing it".
"It's a D," a voice called from the crowd.
Tertiary institutions throughout the country were all
reviewing their operations and shedding staff, Dr Ryan said
after the protest.
He said he did not know how many people had lost their jobs
in the past year or two as it was "hard to keep up" with
figures.
Asked if protests made any difference, Dr Ryan said he was
not sure.
Proposals for restructuring were sometimes amended and
sometimes not, he said.
Otago "clearly had a willingness" to radically change the
structure of the College of Education, he said.
- allison.rudd@odt.co.nz
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