Quick Facts
Biography
Stuart Norman McCutcheon is a New Zealand university administrator and current chair of Universities NZ. Until March 2020 he was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Auckland, New Zealand, at which point he was the longest serving current Vice-Chancellor in New Zealand, having served three five-year terms. He was previously Vice-Chancellor at Victoria University of Wellington, and Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Assistant Vice-Chancellor (Research) at Massey University.
In 2012, he was the highest paid public sector worker in New Zealand.
Education
McCutcheon was educated at Massey University where he graduated with a BAgrSc (Hons) with first class honours in 1976 before becoming a lecturer whilst completing a 1981 PhD in metabolic physiology, A study of some factors affecting the resistance of newborn lambs to cold-stress with particular reference to starvation and exposure mortality, studying under M. F. McDonald, C. W. Holmes andAlexander Lindsay Rae.
Controversies
In April 2019, some University of Auckland students complained that individuals wearing swastikas were intimidating students, while fascist posters, stickers and white supremacist messages were reportedly appearing on campus. McCutcheon acknowledged two issues involving a small group of students, but also said there was no evidence of an increase in such problems. Some students thought he was trivialising the matter.
In September 2019, McCutcheon was criticised for not removing posters by a white supremacist group.