Marching through the Dunedin campus to the clocktower, participants of the Tertiary Education Union (TEU) stopwork meeting waved protest signs and chanted slogans such as "two four six eight, stop the cuts, it’s not too late".
This follows the university’s announcement last month that it is seeking to save money due to a $60 million budget shortfall, with options including asset sales, reduced course offerings and potentially "several hundred" job losses.
As part of today’s event, speakers addressed the crowd, including national TEU president Julie Douglas.
Cuts to education "do not heal" and would not improve the situation, she said.
"You don’t open the shop and put nothing in it and expect people to come and buy something."
Otago was part of a national problem, with other tertiary institutions also threatened by a lack of government funding and a lack of education prioritisation.
However, education was vital for a workforce where engineers, health workers and teachers were in short supply.
"What is happening is just not acceptable," she said.
Associate Professor Brian Roper told the crowd the idea the university could do better with fewer staff was nonsense.
The cuts would be the largest attack on those who worked at the university in its history, he said.
"It is not ok to hack and slash this treasured institution of public learning."
Otago TEU organiser Philip Edwards said the event had gone well, and estimated several hundred people had taken part including not only staff but students and community members.
Staff were "terrified" at they would loose their jobs, and the flow on effects of such extensive cuts made it an important issue for the entire city.
The TEU wanted more information about what was being proposed, and believed the university should look to save money in other ways.
