Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 18, No. 1. March 3, 1954
Uses of Fees
Uses of Fees
At this stage we can go back to the central office of the University and see Just what it docs and how it uses the money from fees collected from University Entrance candidates and from yourselves, as well as from those who offer themselves for ad eundem recognition and higher degree examinations. You should understand right at the beginning that though the Government grants about a million pounds a year through Vote Education, as recommended by the Grants Committee to be distributed to the University Colleges, the University of New Zealand receives for its own special purposes from the Government only £6900 per annum. The clerical costs of running the University office arc only about the same as the clerical costs of running the Medical School at Otago. It has always been run on "shoe-string" finances and has been a remarkably efficient and economical examining administrative machine. Then where does all the fee income go?
University Junior Scholarships (40 yearly) | £5,736 | |
University Senior Scholarships (24 yearly) | 2,612 | |
University Research Scholarships (16 yearly) | 3,200 | |
University Postgraduate Travelling Scholarships | (about 10 yearly) | 6,020 |
£17,568 |
Bank charges, etc., make this figure up to £17,615.
Interest on Investments | £3,312 |
Rental revenue on building | 2,359 |
Statutory charge from general fee revenue | 3,000 |
Charge to General Account income for Research Scholarships | 3,200 |
Deficit of Scholarship Account made up from General Fee Income Account | 5.744 |
£17,615 |
You will see then that of the total amount paid in Scholarships, no less than £11,944 had to be found from current fee income to pay the Scholars during that year, and it is the same every year now. It is true that the whole Scholarship system has been built up on fees without consulting the people who had to pay them, but I doubt if you would criticise the system as unwise or shortsighted. It has been of inestimable benefit both inside the Colleges and for overseas travel to a large number of gifted New Zealanders since the system was established away back in 1872.
If we assume that the cost of travel for Senate, Academic Board, Grants Committee, Entrance Board and other committee meetings are met by the Government grant, then the whole cost of running the office, conducting examinations and giving degrees would be paid for from fee income, but the whole surplus is taken up in paying for Scholarships.
As a further service, the University meets all the costs of travel to interviews and administration of Rhodes Scholarships and for other similar Scholarships and it plays a significant part in the selection of Fulbright. Rockefeller, Carnegie, Commonwealth Fund and Nuffield grantees, Shell and other Scholarships and, of course, engages in a multitude of those minor activities which are most efficiently handled centrally. Examples of such services are War Concessions to veterans, consideration of applicants for ad eundem status, and so on.
Next issue Dr. Currie speaks of the Financial and Academic activities of the University of New Zealand.
On this page is the first of a series in which we introduce the upper strata of the University to the uninitiated. All the various Councils and Boards which exist in or about the College must, in a sense, have some relevance to the students. It is our intention that this series, "Know Your University", be an introduction to these Councils and so forth; we hope that in them the relevance to student life and well-being of such organisations as the N.Z. University and the Profesorial Board will be mode apparent. The first article is taken from the speech which Dr. Currie delivered at Curious Cove Congress. It is, we feel, a very good introduction to the purpose and functioning of the N.Z. University, which is at the top of that heirachy of control extending from the students upwards.