Auckland University course shake-up: Backdown after course shake-up sparks academic revolt

They voted overwhelmingly to call for a pause on a wider programme to overhaul the university’s curriculum, rather than the course review only.

One academic described the rare and dramatic step as a “strong message to council that this process has gone off the rails”.

It appears that message has been received.

Vice-chancellor Dawn Freshwater told staff this week that faculty deans had met to decide that any further work on reviewing courses would now be done per the “usual faculty academic procedures”.

“These procedures enable local consideration of the coherence of programmes and offerings as well as academic workloads,” she said in an emailed update.

The Herald has approached university management with questions about what that change will mean for the scope and timeframe of the course review.

Multiple academics have meanwhile told the Herald they still have concerns.

“The vice-chancellor does not seem to realise just how concerned the academic staff are about large parts of the curriculum change, beyond the relatively narrow question of course optimisation,” one said.

“So far, nothing has been done to recognise or address those issues.”

The changes were coming ahead of a planned shift for 2026, when new transdisciplinary courses would start being rolled out.

It had been suggested the review was being partly driven by a need to slash specialist teaching at undergraduate and postgraduate levels – which often came with small course sizes – to make space for generalist teaching at levels of more than 100 students.

Management has maintained the review is part of normal university practice and has rejected the suggestion it’s looking to slash all courses of certain sizes.

In a statement earlier provided to the Herald, Freshwater said the review was about looking for opportunities to “remove unnecessary duplication”, while ensuring the course portfolio was balanced and relevant.

“As new courses are added over time, we rebalance the curriculum by removing other courses that may be duplicative, or are no longer relevant or supported by student enrolments.

“This helps to maintain manageable staff workloads and reduces pressure on timetabling and teaching spaces.”

Jamie Morton is a specialist in science and environmental reporting. He joined the Herald in 2011 and writes about everything from conservation and climate change to natural hazards and new technology.