Closer campus meets need

FORGING AHEAD: AUT University’s vice-chancellor Derek McCormack is excited about the new Manukau campus.

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Students at Manukau's first university will have an advantage over their central Auckland counterparts - they won't have to battle rush-hour traffic to get to class.

The gates to AUT University’s Manukau campus open to students for the first time this month.

The Great South Rd campus has been built on the old Carter Holt Harvey headquarters site and vice-chancellor Derek McCormack says the university will have "benefits for all of Manukau".

And not just for local students, he says.

Postgraduate research and start-up businesses will benefit Manukau city, not to mention the $35 million a year it will pay 400 staff in salaries.

Mr McCormack says AUT decided to open a Manukau campus after analysing the students enrolled at the university and discovering Manukau was disproportionately represented.

"We have the view that AUT needs to serve the whole region and we saw real potential here," he says.

AUT will start the year with a roll of 420 fulltime students. That will rise to 1000 over the next three years.

It hopes to have 5000 students by 2020 but that would require an extension of the facilities.

Students will be enrolled in the first year of degrees in business, health science, midwifery, sport and recreation and all three years of the Pasifika Early Childhood Teacher Education programme.

At postgraduate level, the Manukau campus will offer masters in education, masters in education leadership and executive management courses with credits towards a postgraduate certificate, diploma or MBA.

The courses were chosen after surveying the community and the range will be expanded as the campus develops.

For more information on AUT University and the courses on offer call 0800-288-864.

- © Fairfax NZ News