Police taster course faces chop

By LOUISA CLEAVE

The country's largest tertiary education provider is considering pulling the plug on a police recruitment course.

Police national headquarters said it was not consulted about the Certificate in Preparation for Police Recruitment, as claimed by provider Te Wananga o Aotearoa.

Hundreds of fee-paying students have enrolled for the 18-week course since it was launched three years ago.

The Government has paid the wananga hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding to provide the course.

The wananga website states that the certificate was developed in consultation with the police national recruitment office.

Students at Manukau last year were also promised a trip to the police training college - a "highlight" of the course.

The visit was cancelled at short notice without explanation.

But police say no such trip had been arranged.

"No pre-entry recruitment courses are endorsed by New Zealand Police, nor are invitations extended to institutions that run such courses to enable them to visit the Royal New Zealand Police College," said national headquarters.

"Such endorsement would give false hopes to many course candidates."

Students who attended the course at the wananga's Manukau campus last year have complained to Associate Education Minister Steve Maharey.

A spokesman for the minister said the Qualifications Authority would investigate.

The authority cleared the wananga over a separate complaint about the same course received last year.

Te Wananga o Aotearoa chief executive Rongo Wetere said yesterday that the course would not be offered if it was not supported by police.

"The only reason we ran that course was to endeavour to get more Maori students into the police force.

"If the course did not have support from the police establishment then there's no way I'm going to run it."

He said 60 students had enrolled for the course this year.

The wananga's national security manager, David Nielsen, said he would provide documentation showing the police force and its national recruitment office were involved in developing the course.

"We had full support from the police and directly from the police commissioner."

Mr Nielsen said "four or five" groups of students had stayed at the police college since the course began in 2001.

Police officers in areas where the course was run were involved in tutoring and taking students on work experience, he said.

The wananga received nearly $400,000 in Government funding for the course in 2001-2002. Figures for last year were not available.

Student Hinemoa Nikora, who first raised concerns about the course with the wananga last April, said management had ignored students' pleas then and was still refusing to address the complaint.

"They need to be held accountable for everything that has happened."

The story so far

* Students paid Te Wananga o Aotearoa $2000 for Certificate in Preparation for Police Recruitment course.

* Police say they were never consulted about the course.

* Students say the tutoring was substandard and course items were not provided.