About 30 universities and polytechs held stop work meetings across the country today to highlight to politicians how much they're struggling financially.
The Tertiary Education Union invited politicians from all stripes to meetings to demand a commitment to more funding for the sector.
"This election is upon us and it will make or break tertiary education in Aotearoa," Tertiary Education Union president Julie Douglas told a large crowd at Victoria University.
She said universities had been through a "damn tough year" with "s****y things happening".
"Decades of under investment has seen polytechnics go to the wall. We've seen university slashing courses and ultimately the cutting of jobs," Douglas said.
Otago, Massey and Victoria universities are all proposing job cuts to cope with large deficits.
Victoria University faces a $33 million shortfall and 260 jobs are on the chopping block. Nearly 80 staff have already taken voluntary redundancy. Early next week, staff will hear what jobs will be gone.
At today's meeting at Victoria University, one attendee challenged the candidate for Wellington Central Ibrahim Omer.
"I wrote you a letter in June asking you about the tertiary funding and tell you my concerns, but you never responded and I wonder why?" she asked Omer.
Omer apologised and said it was not intentional. "It could have been slipped away," he said.
The Education Minister Jan Tinetti beamed into the meeting from Tauranga saying she valued the sector.
But some staff were not convinced.
"Labour is showing up with too little too late and they've been silent all through this year. One of those questions that said 'where were you all this time' was a very fair question. They have really not been present," said Mark Masterson, an associate professor of classics.
Tertiary Education got a 5% increase in the May budget and in June the Labour government committed an extra $128 million over two years. TOP, the Green Party and Labour are the only parties to sign up so far to the union's pledge for more funding.
ACT said it would look to increase funding at the rate of inflation, while National said it planned to ramp up international student numbers to help universities.
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