OFFICE OF THE VICE-CHANCELLOR 
TE TARI O TE TUMU WHAKARAE 
VICTORIA UNIVERSITY OF WELLINGTON, PO Box 600, Wellington 6140, New Zealand 
Phone  + 64-4-563 5301   Email  [email address]   Web  www.victoria.ac.nz 
Hon. Chris Hipkins 
Minister of Education  
By email: [email address]  
27 February 2018 
Dear Minister 
We are writing to request a confidential meeting with you to discuss several strategic 
initiatives that we believe will align well with your stated intentions for the school and 
tertiary education sectors, the findings of the Future of Work Commission and Labour’s 
Education Manifesto. 
These initiatives are of sufficient scale to have significant system-wide beneficial impacts. 
As such, we believe they will be important cornerstone projects for a bold and influential 
30-year plan for education. 
The initiatives include: 

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  Potential name change: We are investigating a potential name change for VUW 
in order to more effectively leverage the international standing of the university 
and city and better align with our differentiated positioning as ‘New Zealand’s 
globally-ranked capital city university’.  
We are eager to keep you informed of these developments as they progress and look 
forward to an opportunity to brief you on them at your earliest convenience.  
Lastly, we are enthusiastic about the benefits that will result from a refreshed 30-year 
plan for education and we are keen to contribute. As I am sure you are already aware, on 
Friday 9th of March we are co-hosting with the TEU a forum at Victoria on the future of 
universities. We would be honoured if you or your senior officials were able to participate.  
 
 
Yours sincerely 
 
 
 
 
Neil Paviour-Smith 
 
 
 
 
Grant Guilford 
Chancellor   
 
 
 
 
Vice-Chancellor  
 
 

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