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North Island universities are blaming high employment and a drop in school-leavers with University Entrance for a big fall in enrolments by New Zealand students.
All five North Island universities told RNZ they had started the year with fewer full-time-equivalent domestic students than the same time last year.
The drop was trivial at Waikato, but significant at the remaining four institutions.
The two South Island institutions that shared their figures with RNZ, Canterbury and Lincoln, reported increased domestic enrolments.
All seven universities that provided figures reported big increases in foreign enrolments compared with the same time last year, which had been expected due to the removal of Covid-related border restrictions late last year.
However, at Victoria and Massey universities, the increase in foreign enrolments was not enough to make up for the decline in domestic students.
Victoria University. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
Victoria had about 1470 fewer New Zealand students than at the same time last year on a full-time equivalent basis, a drop of 10 percent. The inclusion of foreign students left Victoria with eight percent fewer FTE students overall.
Massey University had 1154 fewer domestic full-time equivalents compared with the same time last year, a fall of eight percent. Foreign enrolments increased, but its overall total was still four percent lower than at the same time last year.
Auckland, the largest of the universities, had 1351 or five percent fewer FTE domestic students, and increased foreign enrolments left it just 142 students short of the number of full-time equivalents it had at the same time last year.
Waikato had 80 fewer FTE New Zealand students than the same time last year, but its foreign enrolments increased 340 FTEs, leaving it with three percent more FTE students overall than the same time last year.
Waikato University. Photo: CC 2.0 BY-SA New Zealand Tertiary Education Union from New Zealand
AUT had 541 or four percent fewer domestic FTE students than the same time last year, but the drop was balanced by a 586-FTE increase in foreign students.
Meanwhile, Lincoln and Canterbury universities reported growth in both their domestic enrolments and international enrolments.
Otago University refused to provide figures until after its April council meeting.
Lincoln said it had 82 more FTE domestic students and 86 more FTE internationals giving it a total of 1361 FTE, an increase of 14 percent.
Canterbury said its domestic enrolments were up five percent or 672 on an FTE basis and its international FTEs had increased 62 percent.
Meanwhile Te Wānanga o Aotearoa, the only wānanga to provide figures, said its FTE enrolments were five percent or 790 FTE students lower than the same time last year.
The University of Auckland said it had been expecting a fall in domestic enrolments this year, but the actual result was lower than expected due to "the relatively low numbers achieving University Entrance".
AUT said its full-year outlook was uncertain because it relied more heavily than other universities on enrolments in the second half of the year.
Waikato University vice-chancellor Neil Quigley said the university was performing against the odds.
He said international enrolments had increased and so had enrolments in the university's law, engineering and nursing degrees, and its Māori immersion diploma.
Massey University described its eight percent drop in domestic FTE students as slight and said its was prone to labour market shifts.
It said its international enrolments increased by 26 percent on a FTE basis but it would take several years until its numbers reached pre-Covid levels.
Victoria University said its enrolments "have been affected over the past few years by the intersection of changes in student demand, the growth of new areas of study and the waning of others, demographic changes, unique economic conditions (i.e., low unemployment and growing cost of living), closed borders, and the broader impacts of Covid-19".
The university said its increased international enrolments were pleasing, but it would take another year or two before numbers returned to pre-2020 levels.
Te Pūkenga deputy chief executive Gus Gilmore said it had 163,538 students enrolled, including 4456 international students, about 10 percent fewer than the same time last year.
In terms of full-time equivalents the institute had 38,145 in tertiary courses and 12,660 in industry training or apprentices.
"Enrolments in campus-based learning tend to drop when there is low unemployment and plenty of job opportunities. This is not specific to Te Pūkenga, this is a pattern that we have seen before and we are trying to move away from a system that moves through cycles of 'boom and bust' based on how the economy is performing," Gilmore said.
Number of factors contribute to low enrolments - Whelan
The country's director of universities says the cost of living crisis is hitting students as many lessen their study workload in order to get part time jobs.
"Students that were studying part-time, what we're hearing is that they're taking lighter loads on average" - Chris Whelan
Executive director of Universities New Zealand Chris Whelan said low enrolments could be attributed to many different things.
Usually about 2000 school leavers go overseas to study at university but that had not happened while the borders were closed during the pandemic but now that the borders had reopened they were going back overseas, he said.
Whelan said he had also heard a number of returning students were now taking a gap year because they had not been able to do the usual gap year between finishing school and starting university due to the pandemic.
"Probably the other factor that we're seeing is students that just are dealing with cost of living pressures, they're reducing their course loads - so there's at least one university where the actual number of students is up, but the average full-time student load is actually down."
It seemed that some students who were studying part-time were now taking fewer papers because they had to earn extra income, he said.
If students numbers continue to drop it would mean job losses at universities, Whelan said.
"Every university is dealing with some pretty significant financial head winds at the moment, the funding per students has declined by about 16 percent over the last 10 years and it's forcing every university to make some pretty hard decisions."