What is affirmative action in tertiary education? An overview of affirmative action policies in health professional programmes, drawing on experience from Aotearoa and overseas

Both the universities of Auckland and Otago have had affirmative selection policies for entry into health profession programmes for a number of decades. These policies have been created and strengthened as a result of the leadership and advocacy of Maori leaders, academics and communities. The aims of this paper are to: 1) define affirmative action and outline the rationale for affirmative policies, 2) give examples of how affirmative action policies have been implemented in Aotearoa, and 3) give examples of legal challenges to affirmative action drawing on international experience. Affirmative action policies for health professional programmes are a strategy for improving equity in health through raising the participation of members of population groups that have been historically excluded or under-represented. There are a range of arguments in favour of affirmative policies: constitutional obligations related to Te Tiriti o Waitangi; health professionals from under-represented communities are more likely to serve their communities; they help address biases in healthcare delivery, thereby improving the quality of care; they contribute to health equity through the impact their careers have on the education of others; they are more likely to focus their research on communities they serve and engage with; and their leadership has the potential to benefit the entire system. Legal challenges to affirmative action have been common in some overseas jurisdictions and have resulted in some instances in weaker, or absent, affirmative action policies. We conclude that strong affirmative action policies in tertiary health profession programme admissions contribute to achieving health equity. While much of the literature focusses on admissions to medical programmes, the principles of affirmative action apply equally to all health profession (and other) programmes in Aotearoa.