FUTA HELU’S DREAM KEEPS COMING TRUE

For 49 years ʻAtenisi Institute has continued to offer tertiary courses in social science, natural science, humanities, and the arts … typically culminating in a B.A. or B.S. degree received ad eundem at the University of Auckland.

Among the institute's distinguished alumni are Drs Robin Havea (campus director, Univ. of the South Pacific/Tonga), Siosifa Ika (analyst, human services dept., Western Australia), ʻOpeti Taliai (former university dean, ʻAtenisi), and alum Vaʻinga Tone continues as Tonga's Ambassador to the United States of America.

Message from our former President

Nearly 50 years ago my father launched a university here at ʻAtenisi. He believed that students should be taught how – not what – to think.

He would have been dismayed by the current drift towards commercial and technical instruction at universities throughout the world.

He believed the pillars of classical education – philosophy, mathematics, history, literature, and music – remain the most effective facilitators of critical analysis.

Mere skill, he argued – whether commercial or technical – dooms the expert to focusing on trees whilst the forest burns. Indeed, from global recessions to nuclear power plants, we have seen economists and engineers watch helplessly as the results of their one-dimensional knowledge collapse before their eyes.

To prospective under- or postgraduates … to Tonga’s working people … to visiting consultants and scholars from overseas, we say talitali lelei: take advantage of ʻAtenisi’s B.A., B.S., and postgraduate programmes, 5000-volume library, Tongan dance and language instruction, vocal and instrumental coaching, and free evening lectures.

At age 49, ʻAtenisi remains wise and innovative. There’s simply nothing in the Pacific like it.

Institute former president

ʻAtenisi registration

An affiliate of the Macmillan Brown centre
for Pacific studies