In the 3 years that it has been operating under its present format, Arts Council has received both compliments and criticisms. The intention of this paper is to present neither, and to comment instead on what appear to be some of the fundamental problems of the Council.

Professional vs Voluntary

In order to survive, NZSAC must work with voluntary helpers on each campus. Consequently the success rate of ventures is closely tied to the enthusiasm and commitment of workers on campus. If a CAO is not feeling enthusiastic about a promotion, or is in experienced a tour will suffer and losses can be made In most cases CAO s/NZSAC reps are student volunteers, but this can create problems when NZSAC work becomes demanding, as students under present assessment methods have little flexibility of lime and cannot always drop everything for NZSAC work. This means that NZSAC workers tend not to be 'real' students which, from students association points of view is undesirable. All this means that the one professional worker in Wellington is faced with the difficult task of ensuring that all the requirements of a given project are met

Programme

We are told that to obtain the QEII grant, we must run some projects which can be open to the public. This has the advantage of bringing in money from slightly higher public entrance charges, but raises the question of whom should NZSAC serve. Should students put a name to an organisation which allows an outside group to dictate in any way what its activities should be?

Are QEII justified in demanding that NZSAC go beyond its own constituents, and present promotions open to the public, when NZSAC on a national tour can probably reach a larger and more diverse range of people, to more effect, than many other groups are capable of doing? While admitting that public promotions have done a great deal to raise NZSAC prestige, we must ask ourselves whether the public seasons are worth the effort. Would we do better to keep the New Zealand Students Arts Council as an organisation for students? Or are we going to view the public promotions as opportunities to rip off members of the public to subsidise students, if this is, intact, the case?

Who pays?

You know who pays

The last time NZSAC discussed how to deal with the debt, it was suggested by some constituents that NZUSA stand the loss. After a while, it was pointed out that such a course would allow STANZ members to escape without paying a cent, and thus a large proportion of the debt was divided amongst all NZSAC constituents. However, NZUSA and university constituents are still carrying the heaviest financial burden for NZSAC, Do university constituents wish this situation to continue? By maintaining NZSAC in the form of a standing committee of NZUSA, NZUSA does at least have an advantage in the power of veto over NZSAC. Is this power worth having? It hasn't done either party much good so far.

Non-university constituents become irate at the mere idea that NZUSA can interfere with their' Arts Council, but lose no sleep over the thought that universities are supporting and massively subsidising this Arts Council. It would thus be very helpful if this situation were corrected, especially with the increasing number of joint campus councils.

Close to Home

Many Cultural Affairs Officers around the country are working on strictly local projects with varying degrees of success, in the attempt to stimulate interest and activity on a campus level. Except in the Northern Region, there is very little communication between campus CAO's, which means that much of the work carried out by individuals is for single projects and is not seen on other campuses. There is a need in the present SAC for greater awareness of the activities among students on campus. The Arts Council newsletter now discontinued went part-way towards informing campuses and NZSAC personnel: it made the ordinary campus CAO feel as if others were interested Public relations is one of the fields in which NZSAC is falling down: what is the rationale behind having public promotions when students themselves don't know about NZSAC, and don't care either? Arts Council could function as a resource centre' for CAO's something which is vitally important for in-experienced people, and could develop lines of communication between constituents so that ideas and projects could be shared. At present, communications (when ther are any) seem to beat a track to and from head office.

Who Cares?

One of the problems to be faced is that, all along the line, very few people offer constructive criticism of give ideas. Students on campus are rarely moved to comment, and CAO s are often tempted not to consult students. In turn CAO's are frequently guilty of having no opinions or preferences, and rarely bother to criticise or offer ideas. The people who do complain frequently do so on political or financial grounds and are often people who have not worked for NZSAC itself Cultural Affairs Officers tend to be political nonentities, on university campuses, at least and are rarely very opinionated at NZSAC meetings It would probably be a good move to institute a cultural commission at NZUSA Councils in order to make university CAO's and NZSAC reps aware of the consequences of their decisions at NZSAC meetings, and to make them more aware of the difficulties/advantages of being university constituents

Fundamentals, or back to the Drawing Board

One of the fundamental difficulties of the New Zealand Students Arts Council is that it has grown and developed without any real policy guidelines; this is complicated all the more by inherent differences between the types of institutions which are involved. This means that when decisions must be made, we tend to operate in a vacuum as far as policy goes. Because of the difficulty in canvassing opinion, we can't even make decisions by referring to a solid base of student opinion: we only know after the event if something was popular, which doesn't console the Accountant. NZSAC meetings usually allow very little time for discussion on where the Council is going and what it wants to achieve. This is partly because there is so much programme-planning and reporting to be done, and partly because of the reluctance of delegates to discuss such matters when opportunity is given. This last factor stems in part from the campus situation of the CAO who usually receives little support from more politically-minded executive members: political CAO's are a rarity, on university campuses at least. The fact that most CAO s are in the job for only one year further complicates the situation, as there is little continuity of experience, and a year gives only a short time to develop a balanced opinion on NZSAC. Thus, while NZL'SA is primarily policy-orientated, NZSAC is orientated mainly towards providing a programme. This, of course, reflects the basic difference between the two organisations, but it would be highly desirable for NZSAC to develop policy to guide its development, which should be tied to the Objects of NZSAC as listed in section 3, Schedule D of the NZUSA Constitution:

Schedule D of the NZUSA Constitution

3 Objects

This constitution is presently undergoing review, but it is unlikely that this section would be drastically changed It is quite clear, however, that not all of these objects are being achieved or even being considered by Constituents in planning the year's programme.

The basic question to consider is what we want Arts Council to do and lied to this, what we expect from the Director. Do we want the Director to work as a kind of promoter, or do we expect more general cultural work as outlined in the objects of the Council." This is not a question which will be answered here: it is for the students of New Zealand to decide what is in their best interests and there is no doubt that this will not be an easy task