Summary

New Zealand's Tertiary Education System is the last of six reports to be published in the Profile & Trends 2016 series.

The five other reports are:

• New Zealand's Annual Tertiary Education Enrolments
• Tertiary Education Outcomes and Qualification Completions
• New Zealand s Workplace-based Learners
• New Zealand s Tertiary Education Research, and
• Tertiary Education Sector and Student Support.

Most of the statistics in Profile & Trends were derived from returns provided by government-funded tertiary education organisations to the Ministry of Education and the Tertiary Education Commission. Also, much of the information in the reports came from different agencies and organisations outside the Ministry that have responsibilities for tertiary education.

Profile & Trends 2016: New Zealand's Tertiary Education System begins with the tertiary education trends for 2016 ,which include the progress made in education and skills attainment of the New Zealand population, the main trends in tertiary education enrolments and important tertiary education events that took place in 2017.

Chapter 2 describes government-funded tertiary education and training, changes to the tertiary education system in 2016, the organisations that make up the tertiary education sector, information on tertiary education legislation, and how the government-funded tertiary education system works.

Chapter 3 covers New Zealand's tertiary education provision. It begins with an overview of the changes in provision in 2016, followed by descriptions of provider-based tertiary education, industry training, Youth Guarantee and other types of tertiary education provision. This chapter concludes with a description of the New Zealand Qualifications Framework, research and knowledge creation and its transfer, and the quality assurance of tertiary education.

The postscript (chapter 4) provides an overview of Budget 2017 tertiary education expenditures, the latest student support changes, 2018 fees-free tertiary education, as well as the provisional enrolment indications for 2017.

Chapter 5 lists the contact information for key tertiary education agencies, providers, industry training organisations,and sector groups. It also contains a list of commonly used definitions and acronyms, as well as technical information to help interpret the analytical material used in the reports. A list of figures and tables is included at the end of this report.

The Profile & Trends 2016 series represents the 19th annual survey of the tertiary education system to be published by the Ministry of Education.