PTEs do well in the government research funding rankings

Private training establishments have been ranked well in the Performance Based Research Fund results released last month.

After the seven older universities, Independent Tertiary Institutions (ITI) members filled places 8, 9 and 10.

They also placed ahead of two polytechnics, four colleges of education and a wananga.

"These are great results that show the strength of private tertiary education in this country," said ITI executive director Dave Guerin.

The ITI establishments in the ranking were: Carey Baptist College (ranked 8), Anamata (9), Bible College of New Zealand (10), Whitecliffe College of Art and Design (14) and Bethlehem Institute of Education (22).

The five PTEs specialise in subjects such as theology, te reo Maori, art, counselling and teacher education.

"ITI's members were some of the first institutions outside of the university sector to receive degree accreditation and the PBRF results show that their staff are doing a great job. PTEs can stand tall on the basis of these results," Mr Guerin said.

"The ranking provides a useful benchmark for the tertiary education sector's performance." Mr Guerin said the assessment of research quality was a necessary step for the tertiary education sector.

ITI members also looked forward to the assessment of teaching quality and graduate outcomes being carried out and published.

"When that happens, students and others will have a complete range of information to make study decisions," he said.

Associate Education Minister Steve Maharey, when releasing the rankings, said: "The PBRF allows us to reward research excellence and move away from a crude 'bums on seats' approach to funding research which was based on student numbers."

Resources

The ranking list is at this web page.

The PBRF funding allocations.

The full PBRF report is online as a PDF document.