Tertiary education programmes that don't deliver results face the axe as the Government runs the ruler over the sector.
Prime Minister John Key yesterday signalled a shake up when he told Parliament "urgent problems" in tertiary education had to be addressed.
"We are concerned that as a consequence of previous ad-hoc policy changes, there are a large number of tertiary programmes, particularly below degree level, that have drop-out rates as high as 50 percent, and that some of these programmes fail to properly equip students for the jobs they seek," he said.
"We simply must improve the value we get from our tertiary education investment, both on behalf of taxpayers and employers, and on behalf of the students who take these courses."
Mr Key said the Government would this year work on policy changes needed to ensure tertiary education providers delivered courses that were relevant to the modern job market and were of a consistently high quality.
He also signalled changes in student support, saying the Government wanted to make sure that "taxpayers' generosity" was not being exploited by those who refused to take their tertiary studies seriously or showed little inclination to move into work.