Tommy Wilson: Top marks for campus initiative

Willy Moon and Natalia Kills, the ex-judges on the X factor show, were taught some manners.

Many or most of us pick up the paper some time during the day and look, read, learn and listen to the opinions of people who we regard as informed.

And from there we make up our minds as to agree or disagree with what they have to say.

Many of us base our opinions on information we have received and we choose to accept or reject it, some leaving it on the sideline, hoping it may make sense up ahead in the distant future or another lifetime.

For me serving drinks with a straw in a preserving jar, as is the new cafe culture, is one of them I don't get, as is showing credits for five minutes after a movie has finished and everyone's attention has done an Elvis - and long left the room.

I just don't get it so I park it.

Somewhere in the middle of what we read or listen to is the madness and the sadness and this last week it was all about what some would say was extreme ways to becoming noticed.

Notoriety by slamming one of Invercargill's new found favourite sons on the X Factor reality series was one of them as was another five seconds of fame seeker from the 'Cargill', who has been taking a dump every Friday in one of their public swimming pools.

For me attention seekers are applause junkies and having been married to a stand-up comedian I understand the emotive outbursts of attention seekers.

Either way if you try to dump on or dump in Invercargill you are going to be left with a lot more than egg on your face, as was the case for Willy Moon and Natalia Kills, the ex-judges on the X factor show who got dumped for dissing crowd favourite Joe Irvine and left the limelight quicker than a one-handed cricket ball catcher at the cake tin.

The rest of the news we work out what we don't know until we know it and much of that knowledge is learned as we thumb our way through the pages of life in an institute of some sort or another.

Many cities have learning institutes as the cornerstone of their identity, such as Dunedin and Wellington and now the opportunity for this to happen in Tauranga is about to take a giant step forward next Tuesday.

No I am not talking about this coming Tuesday when the South African Green Chaps will learn a lesson from the New Zealand Black Caps at Eden Park, and finals fever will grip our nation in a unifying way that not even Winston will be able to slam dunk and divide.

The following Tuesday is when the sell out black tie dinner at ASB Stadium takes place to celebrate the signing of a sister city University partnership and it could well be the coming out of the new face of Tauranga.

Education is the fifth biggest revenue earner for New Zealand and the potential for it to climb to the top of the ladder here will become evident next Tuesday evening when Bruce Verner, chairman of the Regents of Californian Universities, consisting of 10 campuses and 300,000 students, will be the guest of honour.

In a somewhat serendipitous circle of citrus and sister city partnership involving San Bernardino, where Orange festival was once the common cause, another fruit from the vine of California will be planted into our local community and economy.

Bruce Verner and local business leader Paul Adams have taken their long-standing friendship to a new level of learning opportunities for tomorrow's students, and if we pick up the opportunity to forge this sister city campus, our children will not have to hikoi across the Kaimai to gain a korowai at a university level.

The US spends the same amount on locking up as it does learning when we consider its prisons' budget is $100 billion per year or parallel to its tertiary education budgets.

And if we don't change our priorities in placing more importance on education and the provision of world class learning facilities, we could well head down the same slippery slide to prison being the quicksand to our people's qualification-based, employment-earning potential.

Just like reading the local newspaper or listening to the nightly news, what Bruce Verner has to say next Tuesday night could well be the best news, as far as waking up a sleeping giant in our city, if not our country, by creating a campus-based 'sister city soul' for downtown Tauranga.

broblack@xtra.co.nz

Tommy Wilson is a best selling author and local writer.