Almost 250 University of Otago students were suspended last year for failing to pass an adequate number of papers as the university increases its focus on producing quality students, vice-chancellor Prof Harlene Hayne says.
At a university council meeting yesterday, Prof Hayne said Otago student numbers were down 1.3% compared with last year, due in large part to an increased focus on "quality" over quantity of students.
The decrease was also influenced by a drop in the number of international students enrolling at the university.
As of April 1 there were 18,102 equivalent full-time students (EFTS) enrolled at the university. There were 18,333 EFTS enrolled at the same time last year.
Prof Hayne said the focus on quality meant an increase in the numbers of students being suspended for failing to pass an adequate number of papers. Two hundred and forty-nine students were suspended under the university's academic progress policy at the end of 2011 compared with 84 at the end of 2010.
Prof Hayne said this signalled a shift from past years when there was an "ever increasing" focus on lifting student numbers.
"We really are taking a different strategy which is based on quality," she said.
The focus was already "paying off" for the university, with 84.4% of students passing at least two-thirds of their academic credits in their first year of study in 2011 compared with 81.6% in 2010, she said.
The decrease in enrolments could also in part be attributed to a 5.9% decrease in international students.
This included a decline in single-semester "study abroad" enrolments from North America, which were down by 34 EFTS in 2011.
Feedback suggested that the high New Zealand dollar, the poor state of the United States economy, restricted budgets at US universities and negative impressions of the South Island as a safe destination all contributed to the decline.
"Study abroad" enrolments were also unusually high the previous year.
In contrast to an overall decline in domestic enrolments of .9%, first-year domestic enrolments were up 5.4%, with a 9% increase in first-year students coming from the South Island and a 1.2% increase in North Island first-year students.
