Alwyn Poole: The current NZ government is already too little too late on significant aspects of education

I have been in teaching/education since 1991 and chosen to do an annual analysis of the New Zealand system through processing a range of data.

There is no doubt, regardless of who is in government, that the performance of the NZ system has been in decline – especially in the last 15 years – based on internal and international measures.

I have also looked at the approach of government and Ministers. It is not overly cynical to say Labour does little to improve education for Māori, Pasifika and the poor because they vote for them anyway. National does very little to improve education for Māori, Pasifika and the poor because they will not vote for them regardless.

The current Government and Minister Erica Stanford are no exception and, in terms of secondary education, may well be lowering the bar even further.

I do not rate myself a good driver and consider, given the number of small dings, I am lucky to still be insurable. What I do know though is that, in a real crisis, you brake hard, accelerate hard, or change direction quickly. Doing much the same thing turns a crisis into a disaster.

New Zealand education is in crisis because:

• Thousands of 5-year-olds begin school without good routines, good behaviour, sound language development and basic numeracy.

• Term 1 full attendance shows a slight lift on term 1 2024 but is still 8% below 2019. Māori full attendance is 20% below European. For schools serving lower socio-economic students, attendance remains woeful at just 50%.

• By international measures, NZ has the biggest gaps between high- and low-achieving groups and schools that serve poorer communities compared to those which serve the more affluent.

• Social interactions in many schools are in crisis and PISA shows NZ has the highest level of bullying in the OECD (surely contributing to our mental health and suicide statistics).

• Outcomes for NCEA/UE are declining and the 2024 leavers’ data – to be released soon – will show a major decline for Māori and Pasifika due to the appalling manner of the Ministry of Education’s introduction of the co-requisites for numeracy and literacy.

• Many young people leave school too early and without qualifications. In 2023 28% of Māori school leavers did not even have Level 1 NCEA. In 2023, more than a fifth of students left school before turning 17. For Māori students, this figure was 36.4%.

I have no doubt Erica Stanford is a nice person with a degree of positive intent as Minister of Education. However, she has barely recognised that our education system is in genuine crisis. As a driver she has barely braked, accelerated or swerved.

Stanford recently stated: “We know the most important part of a child’s education is the quality of the teacher in front of them.”

She is deeply wrong. Teacher quality is important but far more important is the developmental and supportive role of parents. As with previous governments, National has done little to recognise this – with the exception of threatening parents of truants with fines. NZ desperately needs an independent Crown Entity for Parenting to ubiquitously inform parents of best practices for development and emphasise how important great parenting is.

“Structured literacy” may well be superior as an approach to the “whole language” system. However, it is not a solve-all as there is a range of ways children learn and just repeating the phrase “science of learning” convinces few teachers and also pushes many parents away. Imposing this practice on schools is singing to Stanford’s chosen choir and misses the point that children actually being at school every day is the greatest component of in-school learning. The Budget allocated just 0.7% of VOTE education for improving attendance.

Chris Abercrombie of the PPTA noted that the Budget did little for secondary schooling. The best Stanford could do was to say the 2026 Budget would do more. It is known that she put many policy proposals on hold until her second term when initially meeting with ministry officials.

The Year 11–13 students in their qualification years have deserved much more from her during the current term. There are some changes that would be easy to create and effective.

Perhaps the worst aspect of the current reign of National regarding education has been the perpetuation of inept leadership and massive financial waste through the Ministry of Education. Two key indicators are:

• The previous Secretary for Education left in late 2024 and a new one has yet to be appointed. The acting one has just been stretched out for another year.

• There has been almost no personnel change in the upper levels of the ministry. In the lead-up to the election promises were made to return its head count to the 2700 prior to two terms of Labour government, which saw it reach 4200.

The March public sector employment figures have just been released, and the ministry still has 3900 full-time equivalents. The Minister chose to cut the “Communities of Learning Programme” – which was working in some areas – before challenging the ministry, which is an anachronism and a powerful handbrake on the achievement of NZ young people.

New Zealand desperately needs inspirational leaders in education for children of all demographics. The whole population should be hoping for a great deal more over the next 18 months.

Alwyn Poole, a well-known figure in the New Zealand education system, he founded and was the head of Mt Hobson Middle School in Auckland for 18 years. This article was published HERE