[3] OPSA is often involved with local authorities representing a student view, especially in transportation and housing issues.
King Edward Technical College set up the Polytechnic Full-time Students’ Association in 1964 to organise social and sporting activities for full-time tertiary students in anticipation of King Edward Technical's split into Otago Polytechnic and Logan Park High School.
OPSA became an incorporated society in 1976, officially a not-profit making organisation in 1986, and was awarded charitable status in 1994.
OPSA was a founding member of NZTISA, the national student body of polytechnics and technical institutions, in 1971.
[7][8] In 2008 and 2009 OPSA took the unusual move of threatening to expel any members involved in illegal violence at the Undie 500.