JD
Disgruntlement drifted through the corridors and quadrangles of the university. ‘Indeed, it’s been a while since any of us were particularly gruntled,’ said Associate Professor Siouxsie, whose particular gripe had to do with the Pulpit of Truth being disenfranchised, resulting in no more calls upon her services, or boosts to her ego from appearances on TV for absolutely yonks.
Of course there were other things contributing to APS’ state of mind, not least her inability to find a decent hairdresser, but the retirement of the PoT was the main one.
As Lloyd Webber wrote of Evita, “So famous, so easily, so soon, is not the wisest thing to be,” and both the AssocProf and the Pulpit Princess herself could now relate to this as they searched for some relevance in a post-performative, post-Covid world.
But the problem ruffling the feathers of the Archaeopteryxes of Academe wasn’t the above. Nor, if I may digress for a minute, was it the news that the university cellars had run out of the 1947 Premier Cru Claret.
“Disaster. We’ll just have to drink the 1948, even though it’s only a Quatrième Cru,” said the vice chancellor (who still had a few bottles of the ’47 under his bed – for personal medicinal purposes, you understand).
So, if not the TV exposure they were no longer getting, or the more serious fact that the ’47 had run out, what was the problem?
Quite simply this. The ACT party, under the Machiavellian sway of the arch-daemon Dave, was proposing to introduce a bill into parliament to – Shock! Horror! – set up a charter university.
‘It’s an extension of all those charter schools polluting the noble cause of education,’ said the heads of NZEI Te Riu Roa, PPTA Te Wehengarua and the Tertiary Education Union, who had somehow infiltrated this discussion to throw their weight about (without being asked – as usual).
The new charter campus was to be called ‘The University of Dave’ – in homage to a recent innovation in the British banking sector – and its charter would be based on four principles:
1. Teach facts, not doctrinaire opinions.
2. Offer no degrees in underwater basket weaving, advanced macramé or communications studies.
3. Fail students who didn’t pass their exams, and
4. No reference to te Tiriti o Waitangi – anywhere.
“It’s the thin end of the wedge,” said the head of the English Language Department, who loved a good cliché. “This happens and, before you know it, in only a decade or two there’ll be another one.”
“But”, said the Emeritus Professor of Higher Mathematics (who spent most of his time solving quadratic equations for fun, but remembered enough of his initial education, when ’rithmatic was still a core subject, to recognise numerical disproportion when he saw it). “There’s still a massive imbalance. Counting our eight universities, the three wānanga, plus the 16 polytechs, that’s 27 current establishments inside the tent, compared to only one or maybe 2 UoDs outside, so what are we worried about?”
“Don’t you see?” hit back the newly installed chair in Transgender Studies, DEI and Middle Eastern Affairs, who had secured the position ahead of a plethora of other candidates – including three forcibly retired Green Party MPs looking for a new sinecure and at least four others who weren’t LGBTQIA (or even +. How very dare they apply!). “If we let one of these institutions get a foothold, it will destroy the model we’ve been building for the last 30 years.”
“Imagine this,” they said. “All the overseas students who object to paying big bucks to hear someone’s opinion that te Tiriti o Waitangi has been mistranslated and used by the Pākehā establishment to rip off the indigenous population will be queuing up to enrol at UoD.
“All those students who want to compete with others on merit so their degrees can be seen to be actually worth something, when and if they get one, will be enrolling at UoD.
“And all those who want to be taught to argue and reason, instead of swallowing whole whatever orthodoxy we give them, will also be heading for the UoD.
“We’ll be at risk of having almost no one left to indoctrinate.”
“But there could be a bright side,” said the head of the Philosophy Department. “If UoD does get up and running then it’s going to attract the few reasonable, right-of-centre lecturers left in NZ, making our own university 100 per cent left-leaning, staff wise. No more contrary opinion or dissent in the senior common room. What a plus.
“What’s more, with anyone still able to get into our university, by sheer weight of numbers we’ll be able to turn out enough ‘big S’ Socialists to drown out the UoD’s ‘little l’ libertarians – another bonus.”
And so the discussion moved on, at a lively pace since there were no opposing opinions to slow down proceedings. (Plus the ’48 was voted not so bad a lubricant, after all, especially as it was free.)
Then the doors burst open and, with the assembled company genuflecting appropriately, striding into the room came the all-powerful COO/Registrar (he who employs 65 per cent of all university staff, the ‘administrators’ – a group considerably more important than that miserable Rump of Academe, the faculty).
“You know what the real risk is,” he said. “UoD is planning to employ no more than one admin person for every two lecturers – an idea that’s been losing credibility in this country since the 1980s and hasn’t had any at all since the TEU rose to prominence in 2009.
Essentially, we’ve spent decades raising the bar so that we’re almost at the inflexion point where we can forget about the students altogether and the purpose of the university will be to administer the university. But the UoD could ruin this if it ever gets going. So what to do next?”
“Why not ring Grant?” said the Helen Clarke Foundation chair of Blatant Political Appointments. “He’s always got an opinion.”
“And so he should have, for $629,000 per year,” said a resentful junior, a lecturer in Witchcraft, Magic and the Dead (yes it is a real course, I checked), who was still paying off his student loan at the rate of $1,725 per year, roughly what Robbo earns in a day.
Thus the Emergency Red Phone was activated and the orotund baritone of the Rotund Controller resonated down the line.
Although disappointed the discussion he was joining had nothing to do with the Legislation (Definitions of Woman and Man) Amendment Bill, Robbo was nevertheless convinced he could offer a unique perspective on the risks inherent in the creation of the UoD.
“Gentlemen and anyone making up their minds,” he said. “This debate is relevant to my other areas of expertise, namely the criticism of any research and university funding decisions by the coalition. I can tell you how to respond to this threat.
“We have three avenues of attack. Firstly we call for solidarity from our education brethren across the board, primary, secondary and tertiary (at which the union attendees nodded vigorously, salivating at the thought of leading more strike action and boosting their feelings of self-importance).
Secondly we call on the opposition. I happen to know Labour, the Greens and Te Pāti Māori are all looking for a new cause célèbre, as they aren’t achieving much with the ones they’re currently pursuing.
“And, if all else fails, I’ll get my pal Willie to rark-up his mates at the Māori Council, the Iwi Chairs Forum, Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori, the Federation of Māori Authorities, Whakaata Māori and the Waitangi Tribunal.
“Together they can put out a statement that Māori will be disadvantaged if the UoD is established, thus making it indisputably racist.”
And so to the dénouement where, on the understanding that no one knew better than Robbo how to kill off new ideas, those assembled agreed to implement his action plan, with the following results.
The triumvirate of the NZEI, PPTA and TEU joined together and justified a series of rolling strikes across the entire education sector, timed to create maximum inconvenience to NZ’s parental population.
In parliament, the Labour Party’s education team, Ginny Andersen and Shanan Halbert, declared a charter university would fail its students, just as the charter schools programme does (conveniently ignoring that most charter schools achieve good results).
At the same time Lawrence Xu-Nan, the Green Party’s education spokesperson, declared emissions from a charter university would be the last straw that pushed global warming beyond the tipping point to cause drought, floods, fire and famine across Central Africa and possibly beyond.
And Te Pāti Māori performed a haka.
Then Jacko, with fellow trougher JT, organised an anti-UoD carkoi, which was politely received when it finally drove onto the Beehive lawn. (Unlike the Covid convoy 2022, which included Kiwis of every stripe, Willie’s carkoi was more ethnically homogenous in composition and thus could not be so easily disparaged, disregarded or attacked with Barry Manilow recordings without accusations of ‘racism’ being levelled.)
It was at this point, and faced with such determined opposition, that the coalition government caved on Dave – the possibility that they might be subjected to another haka from TPM being the final straw – and the project was shelved.
However, in a final twist to the tail, Dave took his idea to the Cook Islands. There, backed by money from the Republic of China’s ‘Belt and Road Initiative’, the University of Dave was established, successfully, to the point where 20 per cent of the overseas students who previously came to NZ now go to the Cooks.
And in a final irony, due to the loss of this revenue from international tuition fees, half of the lecturers that would not support the UoD lost their jobs.
But fortunately, as always, Grant still did alright.
