Richard Randerson: We're forgetting our prime duty to people's wellbeing

Richard Randerson

Auckland University's mission statement outlines three sets of goals. First, there are operational goals, such as ethical standards, equal opportunity and transparent administrative policies. These indicate how the university goes about its work and are important to ensure effectiveness and right conduct in its life.

Next, the university's core business is spelled out in its academic goals. Listed here are the advancement and dissemination of knowledge, fostering research and creativity, excellence in teaching and learning. The record is that Auckland University achieves highly in these areas.

Alongside the operational and academic objectives are more far-reaching goals that indicate the purpose of academic research and excellence.

These are the university's ultimate goals, which enshrine a commitment to serve the community, and to advance the "intellectual, cultural, environmental, economic and social wellbeing of the peoples of Auckland and New Zealand".

This last is an all-encompassing goal that might be easily forgotten in the pursuit of lesser objectives.

Several years ago I attended my daughter's graduation at another university. The address was given by the vice-chancellor. The occasion was a prime opportunity to inspire and encourage new graduates with a vision of how they might use their gifts and training in the service of those who would call upon them.

Turning aside from such an opportunity, the vice-chancellor instead fished in his pocket and produced a plastic credit card which he promoted as part of the university's new money-raising strategy, urging all present to switch to this card and thus support their alma mater.

Financial pressures on universities have been heavy these past 20 years, and vice-chancellors have had to use every ounce of energy and wit in wrestling with them. But finance is only a means to an end. It is an operational goal, not an ultimate one.

At a graduation ceremony the vice-chancellor's error was to mistake the nature of the occasion by addressing a lesser goal, rather than the greater. This is indicative of one of the gravest omissions in society today, and the institutions that shape them.

Media stories bombard us with accounts of society's wrongdoers - drug-dealers, dangerous drivers, swindlers and thieves, rapists and murderers. They create tragedy and distress enough, but a greater wrong occurs when ordinary law-abiding citizens forget their primary objective to contribute to what the university mission statement names as the wellbeing of peoples.

Individuals forget this objective when they become preoccupied with their own prosperity and advancement. Institutions lose their way when they are dominated by operational goals, and lose sight of such ultimate objectives as providing education, health or justice in the interests of all.

Sin is not a fashionable concept today, but it is linked to an interesting Greek word, amartia. Amartia is an archery term meaning to miss the mark, shoot wide or fall short of the target. It is easy for a society to fail to achieve its full potential not because a minority sets out to do what is wrong but because the majority lose sight of the larger targets to be aimed for.

The sins of omission can be greater than the sins of commission.

A contrasting word, also a little out of fashion, is vocation. Vocation is not exclusively an ecclesiastical term but has universal application. Vocation is to do with the spirit in which any job is undertaken.

If a job is done purely for what one will get out of it, the ultimate objective is lost, the target is missed. But if a job is done with a greater purpose in mind, such as working for the wellbeing of the community, it may be seen as a vocation.

Both individuals and institutions have vocations. This university has spelled out its vocation in terms of seeking to enrich the life of the people of Auckland. Should this goal drop from view and become overlaid by lesser goals, the ultimate objective is not achieved.

Fiscal health is essential, academic excellence a desirable outcome, but the end which these achievements serve is all important.

The same perception and choice faces every graduate and each one of us in the way we direct our endeavours. Do we have wider community outcomes in view in what we do? Do we simply ply our craft, or are we thinking vocationally?

The chief executive of a hospital board told me the other day that he detects a lessening of vocational attitude in young doctors who graduate with huge student loans. The burden of debt, accompanied by a strong user-pays ethos, is producing a climate, he senses, in which fiscal preoccupations impinge on a mindset of service.

This is not a criticism of people in the medical profession, many of whom work tirelessly and sacrificially in dealing with their patients. It is rather an example of something that can happen in any walk of life when sight is lost of the wellbeing of the community.

The erosion of attitudes of public service might well be one of the intangible costs of the economic restructuring of the past two decades. While every profession has the opportunity to contribute positively to the lives of its clients, there are also situations which require a collective endeavour.

Crime, for example, cannot be solved simply by the police. Policy-makers, social workers, families, educationists and community leaders need to work together to solve a problem which is multi-faceted.

Addressing the roots of social and economic deprivation requires a similar mix of expertise and commitment.

Universities are well placed to play a lead in this collective function, drawing together the many skills represented by different faculties. But a community component is also needed.

People in business and the professions, civic and community leaders, need a forum where issues with wide-ranging impact are debated and strategies devised. In this way the wisdom dispersed across the community can be focused for the common good.

* Richard Randerson, dean of Holy Trinity Cathedral in Parnell and assistant Anglican Bishop of Auckland, was delivering a commencement service address at Auckland University.