Taxpayers and Wellington ratepayers will be picking up the tab for yet another political decision that has resulted from the breakdown of law and order and the surrendering of the grounds around Parliament to protesters for three weeks.
Wellington City Council and the Government have agreed to support inner-city Wellington businesses which lost significant revenue during what they described as “the illegal occupation at Parliament grounds” with a $1.2 million business relief fund.
In line with previous contributions to council-led response funds, the Government is contributing $200,000. The City Council is investing $1 million in the fund.
Wellington Mayor Andy Foster is disappointed. He says he originally asked for $6 million to bolster central-city businesses which either had to close, or experienced a huge drop in revenue after the protests.
Instead, the Government offered $200,00 for the $1.2m package that will offer any business which suffered a 50 per cent drop in revenue a one-off $30,000 payment.
A more significant announcement tells us of a Government plan to improve how and what our kids are learning at school.
No, there have been no new developments in the government’s enthusiasm for matauranga Maori to be put on the same basis as science in the school curriculum.
This time the focus is on developing strategies to improve learning across maths, literacy, and communication, “te reo matatini” and “pāngarau” over the next five years.
Hmm. It looks like the Point of Order team will have to go back to school to find out what we are being told by education ministers and the press secretaries who prepared the announcement.
A quick check with the Government’s NCEA website tells us:
Thinking big – it seems – looms large in the considerations of education policy-makers. Here’s hoping it works better for the education of our kids than it did for the Muldoon Government’s energy plans way back.
And if it works (on the numeracy side, at least), then many more taxpayers and ratepayers will be able to work out what percentage of the assistance for business people around the Beehive will be coming from each group respectively.
Point of Order is a blog focused on politics and the economy run by veteran newspaper reporters Bob Edlin and Ian Templeton.
Wellington Mayor Andy Foster is disappointed. He says he originally asked for $6 million to bolster central-city businesses which either had to close, or experienced a huge drop in revenue after the protests.
Instead, the Government offered $200,00 for the $1.2m package that will offer any business which suffered a 50 per cent drop in revenue a one-off $30,000 payment.
A more significant announcement tells us of a Government plan to improve how and what our kids are learning at school.
No, there have been no new developments in the government’s enthusiasm for matauranga Maori to be put on the same basis as science in the school curriculum.
This time the focus is on developing strategies to improve learning across maths, literacy, and communication, “te reo matatini” and “pāngarau” over the next five years.
Hmm. It looks like the Point of Order team will have to go back to school to find out what we are being told by education ministers and the press secretaries who prepared the announcement.
A quick check with the Government’s NCEA website tells us:
* Te Reo Matatini includes tuhituhi, pānui, and reo-ā-waha. The Reo Matatini Learning Matrix outlines the “big ideas” that apply across tuhituhi, pānui, and reo-ā-waha:
* The Pāngarau Learning Matrix affirms that a numerate person is someone who can interweave mathematical and statistical processes and content, and can communicate mathematically. It does so by setting out the relevant Big Ideas and Significant Learning that sits under them:
Thinking big – it seems – looms large in the considerations of education policy-makers. Here’s hoping it works better for the education of our kids than it did for the Muldoon Government’s energy plans way back.
And if it works (on the numeracy side, at least), then many more taxpayers and ratepayers will be able to work out what percentage of the assistance for business people around the Beehive will be coming from each group respectively.
3 comments:
my wife, a primary teacher, is struggling to get her school to allow the Khan Kids app (one of the best & free options for beginner math) to be installed on school tablets. no one knows the mysterious administrator who needs to approve this request. the gap between intent vs outcome is not too hard to predict :(
Absolute garbage. Exactly what we have come to expect from an absolute garbage government.
I can see now why and how Govt workers and politicians have been bamboozled by Maori requests and definitions . If this is an example of the Education's sense of seeing our children better educated , it is no wonder NZ is at the bottom of the worldwide education list ! It sgobbeleygook to most and probably 99% of nZ parents . I bet even 99% of maori don't understand the wording , never mind the meaning .WHO can interpret this sort of language so politicians can understand its true meaning ? Its probably time our esteemed tribal elite set up their own education system by taxing their people directly and not relying on the 85% taxpayers who want no part of spiritual education that takes away reading , writing and arithmetic from the curriculum . Our maori education accomplishments are so low , it wonders if that ethnic group really want their kids educated at all . Todays parents don't seem to care if their children even attend school : their truancy rate is so high , it begs thwe question why attend at all ? Many years ago , the great grandparents insisted their kids attend school so their kids would be able to survive in a white mans world , get jobs and be able to communicate better and maybe even become lawyers or doctors to help their whanau . Todays maori parents lack those management and disciplinary schools that somehow were skipped by the in-between generation . The maori language was not allowed in class, otherwise kids would be talking in their own language , misunderstood by teachers , and disciplined for doing so . If you go to school to lear a different language , the best and fastest way is what is known as "TOTAL IMMERSION " The minute you show up in classroom , only that language you are to learn is allowed to be spoken. AND it works . So maybe , the teachers of old had it right after all . Discipline existed in those days : today there is nil allowed , and it shows in our learning statistics .
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