Strong growth was also expected through Capable NZ, an Otago Polytechnic subsidiary which concentrates on work-based learning and recognition of prior learning, he told the Otago Daily Times after last Friday's polytechnic council meeting.
An innovative master of professional practice degree and a diploma of professional practice are offered through the Capable grouping. Considerable interest had also been shown in courses, mainly in business, offered through the polytechnic's recently-established Auckland International Campus, which focuses on international students.
Otago Polytechnic's ''growing reputation'' for high course completion rates and offering high-quality education were contributing to the enrolment growth, he said.
The polytechnic's survey result was delivered in person to the polytechnic council recently by Wellington educationist Dr Peter Coolbear, director of Ako Aotearoa, a Wellington-based national centre for tertiary teaching excellence.
Dr Coolbear said the polytechnic had excelled, compared with other participating institutions, in the Australasian Survey of Student Engagement (Ausse), in several key measures, such as student and staff interaction, work-integrated learning and overall satisfaction.
The results were ''hugely positive'' and were ''best in show'' for most measures in the survey, and added significantly to the polytechnic's reputation.
Otago Polytechnic director of learning and teaching Dr Sally Pairman said the results reflected a great deal of effort to achieve effective, student-centred interactive learning, mostly avoiding traditional lectures.
Polytechnic communications director Mike Waddell was ''delighted'' by the results of the survey, which was conducted online last August.
The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand, UNITEC New Zealand, the Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology, Wellington Institute of Technology and most New Zealand universities, including Otago University, participated in the survey.
