Educating social workers

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1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, community studies, consumer and applied sciences, family studies, gender studies, home science, Invercargill, social work, sociology, university extension

Social work students working through a scenario in their practice suite, 2010. Photo courtesy of the Department of Sociology, Gender and Social Work.

Because much social work provision comes out of the community sector, the formal education of social workers has been debated vigorously over the years. Otago’s first venture into this field came in 1959, when it offered short courses for social workers at the request of the recently-formed Otago Association of Social Workers and its Southland counterpart. Staff from New Zealand’s first tertiary social work course, which began at Victoria University of Wellington in 1950, visited Dunedin and Invercargill to lead these seminars. Otago’s university extension department continued to offer seminars and lecture courses for social workers through the 1960s, varying topics from year to year so returning students could obtain broad coverage of the discipline.

In the early 1970s the Department of Preventive and Social Medicine proposed a one-year diploma course in medical social work, but this never eventuated because of a lack of support from social workers, probably concerned that the course was too narrow and, worse, controlled by the powerful medical profession. Meanwhile, other professional social work courses got off the ground at Massey, Canterbury and Auckland. Otago decided to carry on with social work education through its extension service. In 1974 a new two-year part-time course for a Certificate in Theory and Practice of Social Work began. Local social welfare agencies provided support for the course, with the ‘work which over-burdened social workers are prepared to undertake to assist the University … a mark of the very great need that they see to have educational and training facilities in social work in the southern part of New Zealand upgraded’. In 1976 Patrick Shannon – destined for a long career at Otago – took on the Department of University Extension’s new role of Lecturer in Social and Community Studies, becoming responsible for the social work course. The course was ‘not a professional qualification’ and received no accreditation from the New Zealand Social Work Training Council, but had ‘a recognised place and value in the education of social workers, and provides a base for entry to further study’. It was popular and enrolments had to be limited.

Meanwhile, there were related developments in the Faculty of Home Science. The faculty had always kept its main focus on the sciences, but there was an element of the social as well. In 1977 the long-standing paper in ‘home management’ became ‘management for family living’ and in 1981 ‘family studies’, incorporating teaching on ‘the inter-relationship of the family and the community’ and ‘community health and welfare’. In 1987 David Buisson, the new dean, created a Community and Family Studies Development Unit ‘to give the impetus for developments in the social science and social policy areas’ in his restructuring of what now became the Faculty of Consumer and Applied Sciences. Over the next two years stage two and three courses in community and family studies replaced the old one-level family studies. The new curriculum covered ‘families in society’, ‘family resource management’, ‘crises in family and community development’ and ‘consumer issues’.

There were obvious common areas of interest between the new unit and the Department of University Extension’s Community Studies Centre. Late in 1988 they merged, bringing the popular Certificate in Social Work into the ambit of Consumer and Applied Sciences. In 1990, majors were introduced to the Bachelor of Consumer and Applied Sciences degree and students could now major in community and family studies. Other curriculum changes offered increasing options for those with an interest in social work. In 1993 the old certificate course evolved into the Diploma in Social and Community Work and in 1994 a new Postgraduate Diploma in Social Services was developed for those who had majored in community and family studies (or had equivalent qualifications or experience); both courses included fieldwork in addition to their theoretical component.

In 2001 community and family studies became an independent department and moved to the humanities division. The new department received a boost a couple of years later when its two social work programmes were the first to be approved under the Aotearoa New Zealand Association of Social Workers’ new certification process. ‘We got incredibly good ratings and there was nothing that had to be improved’, commented Raylee Kane, the Director of Professional Programmes; ‘we’ve set the benchmark and it’s really high’. A variety of new postgraduate programmes – mostly available part-time by distance teaching – added new options. A university review of the department in 2003 particularly commended both Kane and the long-serving head of social work, Pat Shannon, a ‘dedicated and exemplary’ leader. From 2005 a new name – the Department of Social Work and Community Development – reflected better its work, while the 2007 appointment of Amanda Barusch as the university’s first professor of social work boosted its research focus.

The introduction of social worker registration in 2003 presented challenges to Otago’s programmes. Registration was voluntary but some employers required it; clearly qualifications needed to fit into the new framework. In 2007 Otago commenced a new four-year undergraduate qualification, the Bachelor of Social and Community Work (from 2011 the Bachelor of Social Work), to fit the Social Workers Registration Board’s minimum requirement of a bachelor-level degree. Two years of ‘pre-professional’ study was followed by two years of professional education. Registration requirements saw the downfall of the old undergraduate diploma, along with another popular Otago qualification, the Postgraduate Diploma in Social and Community Work.

Shayne Walker teaching students on a block course, 2010. Photo courtesy of the Department of Sociology, Gender and Social Work.

In 2011 the department merged with two other small social science programmes to create the new Department of Sociology, Gender and Social Work – it has been a happy alliance thanks to excellent leadership and motivated staff. Indeed, through all its changes Otago’s social work programme has been fortunate to attract inspirational staff, frequently retaining them for long careers. In addition to helping shape future generations of social workers, staff have played important roles in advising government, and others, on social policy. Their commitment is epitomised in Shayne Walker, whose journey took him from being a child in care to a youth worker and foster parent dedicated to improving the lives of young Maori, long-time lecturer in social work, and now Chair of the Social Workers Registration Board.

Do you have any stories to share of Otago’s social worker education? I’d love to hear some personal anecdotes!

Maori Studies celebrates

Tags

1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Maori, university extension

Maori Studies staff in 1991. Standing (from left): Mark Laws, Maureen Bruce, Godfrey Pohatu, Meredith ?, Michael Reilly, Mereana Smith. Seated: Lorraine Johnson, Toroa Pohatu. They are photographed at the Mataatua wharenui at Otago Museum, often used for Maori Studies events prior to its return to Ngati Awa in Whakatane in 1996. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, University of Otago Photographic Unit records, MS-4185/016, S14-561a.

Maori Studies was slow to get started at Otago, but once underway it grew rapidly and became a key part of the university. This month – 27 March to be precise – marks 25 years since Maori Studies officially became a full university department and in May it will celebrate this anniversary in style.

As I described in a previous post, the Department of University Extension began community classes in te reo Maori in 1957. These classes proved popular and expanded over the years; a considerable number of those involved were students, who did not have any options for including te reo Maori in an Otago degree. It was demand from students that finally got the university talking about offering Maori as an undergraduate course.

In 1971 the Faculty of Arts set up a committee “to examine the case for establishing courses in Maori”. After consulting widely, the committee recommended in 1972 that Otago should establish a Maori programme: after all, studying the language was “both an opportunity and a responsibility for all New Zealand universities” and there was “a genuine and wide interest” in such a course from students. The faculty approved in principle, but promptly shelved further action until 1975, when the next government five-yearly funding block grant began.

The committee believed it was important that “the first member of staff appointed in Maori be of very high academic quality and that the appointment be made at the level of senior lecturer at least.” The focus on academic qualifications had unfortunate consequences. In June 1975 the academic staffing committee decided that neither of the two applicants for the position was suitable. Conscious that Maori language teachers with higher academic qualifications were rare and in hot demand as Maori courses expanded all over the country, the staffing committee took an alternative approach. Ray Harlow, who had a PhD and had already lectured in the Department of Classics, was an able linguist who currently taught in Germany and planned to study Polynesian languages and literature at the University of Munich. Otago offered him a post-doctoral fellowship to study for a year in Germany, followed by a year at the University of Auckland, studying Maori with Prof Bruce Biggs. After his two years of study was complete, they expected to offer him a position lecturing in Maori.

Unsurprisingly, the news that Otago’s first Maori lecturer was to be a Pakeha who had, as yet, a limited knowledge of te reo, caused a public outcry, with letters appearing in the press around the country.The delay of another two years was also a frustration for those campaigning for a Maori course. The university Maori Club – one of the original advocates for an undergraduate course – was particularly critical of the delay and of the appointment of a person without standing within the Maori community, but it was not alone. Over a thousand people signed a petition protesting that the course would no longer commence in 1976. The university also received a delegation of the Maori Graduates Association, consisting of a high-powered group of Maori academics, professionals and students.

In a concession to Maori concerns the university brought forward its original intention to appoint a second lecturer; this time it hoped to attract “a suitably qualified native-speaker of Maori” and the Maori Graduates Association agreed to encourage applications. However, finding somebody proved difficult. In 1979 the Dean of Arts reported that the position had been offered to three people over the past four years but all had declined; Otago still had no undergraduate course in Maori.

Harlow returned to Otago in 1977 and taught linguistics. In 1980 the Faculty of Arts decided it could delay no longer. Having failed to find another suitable lecturer, it introduced a half-unit in Maori language for beginners in 1981, taught by Harlow. This was “an interim measure pending the introduction of a full unit in Maori when a native-speaking lecturer can be appointed.” It’s important to note that nobody had any personal objection to Harlow. When he left for a position as lecturer in Maori Studies at Waikato at the end of 1989 the Maori Centre newsletter noted he had been “an ardent supporter of nga mea Maori generally on campus and at the multitribal Arai-te-Uru Marae.” He was also an able linguist, recognised in his appointment to Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Maori, the Maori Language Commission.

So, the Maori programme finally got underway in 1981, with the class limited to 32 students for the first four years. A new phase of development began with the arrival of Godfrey Pohatu as lecturer in 1986. After ten years of trying the university had finally found its first Maori lecturer of Maori. Pohatu was an experienced teacher who was part-way through a Master of Education degree at Canterbury; he went on to complete a PhD at Otago in 1998. He was also very active in Maori cultural groups and became a well-known composer of waiata. After all the years of delay there were big expectations of Pohatu; he was fortunate to have great support from his wife, Toroa, who was also an experienced teacher and cultural performer, fluent in te reo Maori.

Toroa Pohatu joined her husband as a lecturer in the Maori programme in 1988. The additional staffing was much needed, for the number of students grew rapidly; there were 212 first-years to be taught that year. A cultural paper – introducing basic cultural concepts, mythology, arts and crafts – was added to the language paper in 1987, meaning students could now complete a full stage one unit in Maori. The same year saw the birth of Te Kapa Haka o Te Whare Wananga o Otakou, a Maori cultural group tutored by the Pohatus which had considerable success at Maori performing arts festivals. The Maoritanga paper quickly proved popular with a wide range of students seeking a basic understanding of the Maori world, and it remains one of Otago’s largest papers. Stage 2 papers started in 1989 and in 1990, with the arrival of Stage 3 papers, it became possible to major in Maori Studies.

At Auckland, Massey, Victoria and Canterbury universities, Maori studies commenced within anthropology departments. At Otago, though anthropology was a department where Maori students felt particularly welcomed, the subject of Maori studies had a different path. Rather than being attached to a particular department, Maori started out as a ‘section’ within the arts faculty, directly responsible to the dean of arts and with an advisory committee of the faculty. This allowed it to develop independently and rapidly, but not entirely unsupported. In 1990 – the year when Stage 3 papers were first offered and Otago’s first Maori studies majors completed their degrees – it gained formal recognition as an independent university department.

After these long and tricky beginnings, 1990 was clearly a major milestone for Maori Studies at Otago – something worth celebrating in 2015! The department – which evolved into Te Tumu, the School of Maori, Pacific and Indigenous Studies – has had various ups and downs since 1990, but enters its second quarter-century in a flourishing state with many great achievements behind it. Do you have any memories to share of the early years of Maori Studies at Otago?

Beginnings of te reo Maori

Tags

1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, languages, Maori, teacher education, university extension

Tarewai Wesley, standing on the right, was probably the university’s first te reo Maori tutor. This photograph was taken by the Otago Daily Times in 1948 at Otakou Marae, during the celebrations marking the centenary of Bishop Selwyn’s first visit to Otakou. The official party also included (left to right): George Karetai, Margaret and Thomas Bragg (of Stewart Island) and Bishop William Fitchett. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, S14-184.

Kia ora koutou! In honour of Te Wiki o te Reo Maori – Maori language week – this post takes a look back at the beginnings of te reo Maori at the University of Otago. It is perhaps unsurprising, in view of the distribution of the Maori population, that Otago was the last New Zealand university to establish courses in Maori studies. It wasn’t until 1981 that a limited number of Otago students could take an introductory Stage I course in Maori language, taught by linguist Ray Harlow. After Godfrey Pohatu was appointed in 1986 a full programme in Maori studies gradually developed, proving very popular.

But there is an interesting and little known pre-history to the development of undergraduate Maori language courses at Otago. The first courses in te reo began more than twenty years earlier, through the Department of University Extension, which offered community programmes designed to reach out to the general adult population, particularly the many people who had not received any higher education. The Otago extension department’s annual report for 1957 noted: “For the first time a course was offered in the Maori language; this was well attended by members of the local Maori community.” Fifty-one people, two-thirds of them women, enrolled for the 12-class course. The tutor was Mr H. Wesley. This was almost certainly Harold Tarewai Wesley, a respected kaumatua of the Kai Tahu community at Otakou. He was renowned as a native speaker of Maori in a community where the language seemed to be dying.

After this successful beginning, the university extension department continued to offer evening courses in te reo Maori. Mr Rua Bristowe, a public servant whose iwi links were to Ngati Porou, took over as class tutor in 1958, and was himself succeeded by Mr Te P. Tawhai in 1960. As the 1961 prospectus made clear, the classes had a strong oral focus: “The aim of the course is to equip a student with a framework on which to build a speaking use of the language.” Enrolments in the late 1950s and early 1960s were not as impressive as in that first 1957 class, but varied between 10 and 30 people per year.

It appears that there were no Maori evening classes in 1963. Perhaps there was no teacher available that year, because in 1964 they resumed under a new tutor, Reverend J.N.A. Smith. Jack Smith was the minister of Kaikorai Presbyterian Church, but had previously served for over ten years in various North Island stations of the Presbyterian Maori Mission, where he presumably developed some fluency in te reo Maori. The extension department was responsible for coordinating adult education throughout Otago and Southland, and their report for 1964 also notes what may have been their first course in te reo Maori beyond Dunedin: 11 people enrolled in a language course at Balclutha, where the tutor was Mrs Kaye O’Connell.

As the Maori renaissance gathered momentum through the 1960s, demand for language classes was clearly increasing. In 1967, 45 people enrolled for the Dunedin class, 29 in Invercargill, 24 in Oamaru, and 11 in the small settlement of Otematata. Tutoring was taken over by some of the permanent lecturing staff of the Department of University Extension, Alexander Skinner and Pieter de Bres. De Bres was a Dutchman who had recently completed an anthropology thesis at the University of Auckland on Maori and religion, while Skinner was a linguist (he took leave one year to lecture on African languages at the University of California). Technology became increasingly important: “tape recordings will be used to improve spoken Maori,” noted the 1966 prospectus. Textbooks used in the late 1960s included Lessons in the Maori Language by W.H. Wills and Te Rangatahi 1 and 2.

As more people completed a first course in te reo, the department began offering level 2 and level 3 classes. In 1971 they introduced an “extension certificate,” which provided a formal qualification to those who passed an examination after three years of classes. The first six people successfully completed their certificates in 1973. The certificate course boosted enrolments, though, as ever, many people did not move past a first year of introductory language classes. The mid-1970s saw a return to a native speaker of te reo Maori as tutor in Dunedin. This was thanks to the Dunedin Teachers College, which was ahead of the university in offering Maori language courses to its students. Muru Walters of Te Rarawa became lecturer in Maori at the college in 1974, and the Department of University Extension employed him as a tutor for their Maori evening classes. Walters was a qualified teacher with expertise in Maori arts and crafts (he taught in the teachers college art department before taking on the Maori language role). He had also gained fame as a Maori All Black; he later became an Anglican priest and is now Bishop of Te Upoko o te Ika. Another 1970s tutor was Reverend Jim Irwin, Dean of Maori and Polynesian Studies at the Presbyterian Theological Hall, Knox College. English-born Irwin had worked for many years in the Maori Mission and was fluent in te reo Maori.

Enrolment forms for the occasional year have survived in the archives of the Department of University Extension to provide a little insight into the Maori evening class students. The earliest, for 1967, only give names, but those reveal that quite a few of those enrolling were Maori, particularly in the classes outside Dunedin (of course people of Maori descent did not necessarily have identifiably Maori names). The 1975 enrolment forms for Dunedin also include occupations. These varied from typist and mother to boilermaker and journalist. Quite a number worked in the civil service or “helping” professions – police officer, nurse aide, pharmacist, librarian, teacher, university lecturer. But the largest group by far were students, who accounted for 26 of the 48 enrolments. Some gave details of their studies – two were divinity students, one was a dental student and three were student teachers. But the rest were simply “students”, presumably at university. The failure of the university to provide undergraduate classes in te reo Maori had forced them to enrol in the extension department’s evening classes.

Do you have any memories to share of the Department of University Extension’s classes in te reo Maori? I’d love to hear more about them!

 

 

Otago beyond Otago

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1920s, 1930s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, Auckland, Christchurch, clinical education, executive programme, Invercargill, medicine, public health, radiation therapy, teacher education, university extension, Wellington

In the late twentieth century changing government education policies allowed universities to become very entrepreneurial and expand into the territories of other institutions. Massey University opened a new campus in Albany, not far from the University of Auckland, in 1993 and merged with Wellington Polytechnic, not far from Victoria University of Wellington, in 1999. Otago’s first expansion into other territories came decades earlier, when New Zealand’s universities were under much stricter central control and direct competition was discouraged. The expansion resulted from a desire to provide improved clinical education for senior medical students, at a time when Otago had New Zealand’s only medical school.

In 1923 the undergraduate medical degree was expanded from five years to six, with the last year to concentrate entirely on clinical work. Finding sufficient clinical experience in Dunedin for the lengthened course proved difficult. Dunedin was New Zealand’s largest urban centre when the medical school began teaching in 1875, but by the 1920s Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch were all home to larger populations. The medical school began sending some of its sixth-year students to hospitals in the other main centres and in 1938 these were formally established as the Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch Branch Faculties of the Otago Faculty of Medicine. The Auckland Branch closed in 1972, as the first students of the new University of Auckland Medical School reached senior level (the Auckland course began in 1968).

An aerial view of Wellington Hospital in 1971, soon before its Branch Faculty of the Otago School of Medicine became a full Clinical School. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, negatives of the Evening Post newspaper, reference EP/1971/0946-F.

Meanwhile, big changes were afoot in Wellington and Christchurch. A major 1968 review of the Otago Medical School, undertaken by Professor Ronald Christie (Medical Dean at McGill University, Montreal), recommended big changes to the Otago programme. Noting the inadequate experience then available in Dunedin, Christie advised that, unless the medical school was to be downsized, it needed to expand its Christchurch or Wellington facilities into full clinical schools. After considerable political negotiation (with considerable resistance from advocates for the alternative of the University of Canterbury or Victoria University of Wellington opening their own medical schools) both Christchurch and Wellington became full clinical schools of the University of Otago, in 1971 and 1973 respectively. After the first three years of education, medical classes were divided into three groups, destined to spend the final three years of their education in either Dunedin, Christchurch or Wellington.

Since the 1970s the Christchurch and Wellington campuses, originally known as the Christchurch/Wellington Clinical Schools, have had name changes which reflect their expansion beyond the teaching of undergraduate medical students into other courses, and their significant roles in research and postgraduate education. In 1984 they were renamed the Christchurch/Wellington Schools of Medicine and in 2007 the University of Otago, Christchurch/Wellington. The Wellington campus now has nine academic departments, including radiation therapy, for which it is the sole national provider of undergraduate and postgraduate education. Its Department of Public Health also provides an undergraduate Certificate in Health Promotion by distance education. Wellington researchers, especially public health professors Philippa Howden-Chapman and Michael Baker, frequently appear in the national news. The Christchurch campus today has eleven academic departments, together with a Centre for Postgraduate Nursing Studies and Maori Indigenous Health Unit. Its postgraduate students have outnumbered its undergraduate medical students since the late 1980s.

The University of Otago’s activities beyond Dunedin have not been confined to the health sciences. In the late 1990s it moved into the competitive Auckland education market, offering an executive MBA and opening its Auckland Centre. That centre evolved into an information and liaison facility for Otago in the north, but still offers some Summer School papers and postgraduate distance courses. Closer to home, the university has run numerous courses around Otago and Southland over the years as part of the former Department of University Extension. Its adult education programme was very active in Invercargill and the Faculty of Commerce, among others, also offered various distance papers there for its degrees. The university opened an administrative centre in Invercargill in the 1970s, located in the Southland Polytechnic grounds – a sign of the cooperation between the two institutions in that period. The merger with the Dunedin College of Education in 2007 brought a new relationship between the University of Otago and Invercargill, because the college also had a Southland campus. The university now offers various teacher education programmes in Invercargill, including a degree specialising in primary bilingual education.

When people think of the University of Otago they often think of its iconic Dunedin campus, but it is clearly much more than that! Do you have any stories to share of the northern, and southern, campuses?

Summer school

Tags

2000s, 2010s, summer school, university extension, Wellington

Summer school, from the cover of the 2009 prospectus.

Happy new year! The Dunedin campus came back to life last week as summer school began, so this seems a good moment to look back at the short history of the summer semester, now in its 14th year.

For many decades the University of Otago offered various special courses over the summer, but with a few exceptions these did not give credit towards university qualifications. Most were continuing education programmes, run by the Department of University Extension, which offered a wide variety of opportunities for learning over the summer. People came to Dunedin from near and far for short intensive courses on everything from creative writing to a seniors’ course on the living environment. Bridging and promotional courses were also offered over summer, as remains the case today, with JumpStart Physics and Hands-On Science bringing many people to campus. Beyond Dunedin, the University of Otago, Wellington, established a Public Health Summer School in 1997. This popular programme continues to offer short intensive continuing education courses on numerous public health topics.

This was all very commendable, but did not help students who would like to use the long summer break to complete more of their course. Perhaps they wanted to repeat a paper they had failed, or meet a prerequisite needed so they could change their major, or just to spread their workload more through the year. By 1999 the University of Otago was the only New Zealand university without a summer school offering papers for credit. This clearly put it at a disadvantage in the contest for new students; what is more, some Otago students attended summer schools at other universities to further their learning, showing a clear demand for such a service. The Vice-Chancellor set up a committee to investigate extending Otago’s teaching year. It quickly ruled out the idea of three equal teaching semesters and became the Summer School Working Party. Its final report, in February 2000, recommended that a summer school be introduced, with the first two or three years as a trial. Associate Professor Merv Smith, who had for many years chaired one of Otago’s largest departments, biochemistry, was appointed to the new key position of Director of Summer School.

In January 2001, 700 students arrived on campus to study the 23 papers on offer at Otago’s first formal summer school. This was more students than anybody had hoped for; the programme was a roaring success from the start. After a second successful year, with over 1000 enrolments, the trial was over and summer school was confirmed as a permanent fixture on the Otago calendar. By 2010 summer school enrolments had grown to 2639, but the university had to cap numbers at a lower level the following year to avoid carrying more students than it received government funding for.

Effective writing, computer programming, criminal justice, introductory economics and introductory business management featured among the most popular papers in the early years of summer school. Alongside such bread and butter offerings, some departments quickly recognised that summer school provided an opportunity to provide quirkier courses which might attract new students who would come to do a paper or two just for personal interest. Visiting lecturers – sometimes from overseas – could be appointed to teach a special paper, offering opportunities for some very creative curriculum choices. The only course which might be considered a little out of the routine in 2001 was a second year paper on wine tourism, but soon it had been joined by a wide range of other papers offered only at summer school. Some courses have related to current political issues or to popular culture: theology, money and markets; governing the global environment; the vampire on screen; and the fantasy worlds of CS Lewis, Philip Pullman and JK Rowling, to take four recent examples. Others have introduced completely new subjects into the Otago curriculum: disabilities studies; Arabic language; and, one of the most popular papers of recent summers, forensic biology.

My best wishes to everybody involved in summer school in 2014. You might appreciate some advice given by Vice-Chancellor Graeme Fogelberg in the prospectus for Otago’s first summer school: “Perhaps you will also take some time away from your desks to enjoy Dunedin and its environs at a time when the days are longer and warmer than those during our normal semester programmes.” This summer hasn’t been notable for its warm temperatures as yet, but there are still those magnificent long southern evenings to enjoy!

Experts on the radio

Tags

1920s, 1940s, 1950s, 2010s, biochemistry, chemistry, history, home science, law, mathematics, media, music, physics, politics, public health, radio, university extension, zoology

University of Otago staff are in demand to provide expert comment via the media on a very wide range of topics, and these days they can be accessed in a wide range of formats, from the traditional newspapers, magazines, radio and television to more recent technologies such as blogs and other social media. The university also makes many of its public lectures available via its own channel on iTunesU. Robert Patman, Bryce Edwards and Brian Roper of the Department of Politics appear regularly in the media as political pundits, and Edwards’s blog is a key source for those with an interest in current events. Mark Henaghan and Andrew Geddis from the Faculty of Law also appear frequently in the media.

In the ever-evolving media environment, radio remains one of the most popular means of disseminating some of the scholarship coming out of Otago. Just this morning, my colleague John Stenhouse of the Department of History and Art History spoke about a recent publication revising traditional assessments of one of New Zealand’s early governors, Robert Fitzroy, on Radio New Zealand National; his co-author Hamish Spencer of the Department of Zoology spoke about Fitzroy with Kathryn Ryan on the same station a few days ago. Among the other Otago staff interviewed at some length on Radio New Zealand National in the past month are Graeme Downes and Ian Chapman from the Department of Music (on Lorde’s current hit song), Philippa Howden-Chapman, Professor of Public Health in Wellington (on warrants of fitness for rental housing), Colin Gavaghan of the Faculty of Law (on the patenting of tools for gene selection), Peter Dearden of the Department of Biochemistry (on diet and longevity) and Dave Warren from the Department of Chemistry (on science ‘magic’ shows).

Robert Jack, Professor of Physics and radio pioneer. Photograph courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, Ref: 1/2-220116-F.

It seems only fitting that Otago staff should appear often on the radio, because Robert Jack, Professor of Physics from 1914 to 1948, was the pioneer of radio broadcasting in this country. In 1921, assisted by other staff from the Department of Physics, Jack broadcast New Zealand’s first radio programme, just a year or two after the world’s first radio stations went on air in the USA and Holland. Like many Otago staff both past and present, Jack was skilled at popularising his scholarship in the form of public lectures – the radio offered a new opportunity to reach out beyond the walls of academia. This was clearly the goal of his colleague Robert Bell, Professor of Mathematics from 1919 to 1948, in his 1940 broadcast on 4YA Dunedin, “The human side of mathematics”. As the Listener commented, figures may at first seem dull, but Bell “knows very well how to make them interesting”. The cartoon of the clichéd “hoary old beaver” of a mathematician bore little resemblance to Bell, a dapper Scotsman renowned for his clear thinking and his warm nature.

A cartoon which accompanied the listing for Professor Bell’s radio talk, from the Listener, 9 August 1940. Reproduced with the permission of the New Zealand Listener.

Perhaps the most influential radio programmes to originate from the University of Otago were those presented by the Extension Service of the School of Home Science. The service commenced in 1929 to provide outreach into the community, particularly the rural community, through tutors and a consultation service for the public. I’m not sure when their regular radio broadcasts began or ended, but a 1958 survey of an Otago town (possibly Oamaru) by Judith King of the Department of Adult Education revealed that a quarter of the women surveyed were “constant listeners” to the weekly home science talks on the YA network (intriguingly, King dismissed this as “only 25 per cent”). Most of these programmes focussed on nutrition and foods, but a few surviving scripts in the archives of the Department of Clothing and Textiles reveal that home science staff also gave radio talks on various other topics, such as creating a wardrobe. By the 1960s the Extension Service was also producing cookery programmes for commercial radio stations.

These days we can listen to radio programmes at our leisure by podcast or via the internet, as evidenced by the links in this post to recent broadcasts. Radio was once a much more ephemeral medium, but it could still have lasting significance. In her 1958 survey, King encountered a woman who, each week when the home science radio talk was due, “sat down with pencil and paper to record the ideas and recipes.”

Have radio programmes and interviews with Otago staff had an impact on your life? Were there any particularly engaging radio speakers from the university? Do you remember listening to the home science radio talks? I’d love to hear more about Otago’s radio connections!