However, from an education outcomes perspective - the point of education - the coalition has been hugely disappointing.
A successful pattern for education is theoretically simple. Have all in place in our society to see children develop well within pregnancy and the first five years of life. Have them turn up to school bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Then have a combination of parental emphasis and quality/purposeful schooling that brings children in EVERY day. See to it that the VAST majority of students leave schooling with a purposeful qualification that provides a chance for an aspirational life.
Despite Erica Stanford telling me directly that National would have a parenting policy - there has been nothing and we are stuck with the situation where many children are arriving at their first school lacking the most basic skills. Research tells us that they rarely catch up.
David Seymour – as Associate Minister of Education – has responsibility for improving school attendance. He has completely failed and the response to him at Waitangi gives context to how the lowest attending demographic feels about his contribution to Maori aspiration. He is the wrong man for the attendance role. In term three of 2025 only 36% of Maori students fully attended their schools. To call that a disaster is a major understatement. It is no use having a flash curriculum, methods, etc - if students are not going to school. On top of the attendance crises there are 10,000 children not enrolled anywhere each year - and the Ministry is not even looking for them.
Very little effective has been done for the MANY students stuck between the senior curriculum/qualification reforms - this will have many being a part of a neglected generation. It has just been released that 15,000 more Year 12 and 13 students are at risk of leaving school with no qualifications through not getting through the numeracy and literacy requirements. The co-requisites was a reasonable idea. It was poorly implemented by Labour but has not been improved by the current Minister. We have an ongoing decline in the full range of qualifications outcomes and when the LEAVERS data comes out later in the year it will show a very significant downward trend - especially for Maori, Pasifika and poorer students. For 2024 16% of students left school with no qualification at all. Under Minister Stanford’s watch – in 2025 – it is will be even higher.
Despite the Ministry of Education being a key feature of the failure of the New Zealand education system the Minister has left the Ministry largely untouched and appointed a long-term Deputy Secretary to the top job. Stanford/Seymour promised the Ministry of Education would come back to 2,700 full-time employees – i.e. pre-Hipkins numbers. In September 2025 it had 3,939 employees and climbing. Surely Nicola Wills should be eyeing significant budget savings here. To get a full understanding of how Ministry of Education staff feel about their job – their employee evaluation is worth a read in full. Note; only 41% of employees would recommend the Ministry of Education as a good workplace. Twenty-six percent say they intend to leave within 12 months. Only 62% believe the Ministry is able to give “free and frank advice” to the Minister. The taxpayer resource consumed by the Ministry would be far better transfered to the schools in significant part.
If the trends above occured under Labour the political Right would be castigating them. It is easy to point the finger at the last Labour government but National have been the main party of government for 11 of the last 17 years.
In 2026 there needs to be clear emphasis on - supporting parenting and child development for 0 - 5s. Working much more effectively to get the missing 10,000 enrolled and hugely increasingly regular attendance (a bence-mark could be England’s 75%). Placing a great deal more emphasis on keeping students in school until 17 and lifting all qualfications levels for current high-school students (not just hoping for possible Primary schooling to drift through in future years). And, getting the taxpayer resources for education into the right places.
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 sourced HERE
A successful pattern for education is theoretically simple. Have all in place in our society to see children develop well within pregnancy and the first five years of life. Have them turn up to school bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Then have a combination of parental emphasis and quality/purposeful schooling that brings children in EVERY day. See to it that the VAST majority of students leave schooling with a purposeful qualification that provides a chance for an aspirational life.
Despite Erica Stanford telling me directly that National would have a parenting policy - there has been nothing and we are stuck with the situation where many children are arriving at their first school lacking the most basic skills. Research tells us that they rarely catch up.
David Seymour – as Associate Minister of Education – has responsibility for improving school attendance. He has completely failed and the response to him at Waitangi gives context to how the lowest attending demographic feels about his contribution to Maori aspiration. He is the wrong man for the attendance role. In term three of 2025 only 36% of Maori students fully attended their schools. To call that a disaster is a major understatement. It is no use having a flash curriculum, methods, etc - if students are not going to school. On top of the attendance crises there are 10,000 children not enrolled anywhere each year - and the Ministry is not even looking for them.
Very little effective has been done for the MANY students stuck between the senior curriculum/qualification reforms - this will have many being a part of a neglected generation. It has just been released that 15,000 more Year 12 and 13 students are at risk of leaving school with no qualifications through not getting through the numeracy and literacy requirements. The co-requisites was a reasonable idea. It was poorly implemented by Labour but has not been improved by the current Minister. We have an ongoing decline in the full range of qualifications outcomes and when the LEAVERS data comes out later in the year it will show a very significant downward trend - especially for Maori, Pasifika and poorer students. For 2024 16% of students left school with no qualification at all. Under Minister Stanford’s watch – in 2025 – it is will be even higher.
Despite the Ministry of Education being a key feature of the failure of the New Zealand education system the Minister has left the Ministry largely untouched and appointed a long-term Deputy Secretary to the top job. Stanford/Seymour promised the Ministry of Education would come back to 2,700 full-time employees – i.e. pre-Hipkins numbers. In September 2025 it had 3,939 employees and climbing. Surely Nicola Wills should be eyeing significant budget savings here. To get a full understanding of how Ministry of Education staff feel about their job – their employee evaluation is worth a read in full. Note; only 41% of employees would recommend the Ministry of Education as a good workplace. Twenty-six percent say they intend to leave within 12 months. Only 62% believe the Ministry is able to give “free and frank advice” to the Minister. The taxpayer resource consumed by the Ministry would be far better transfered to the schools in significant part.
If the trends above occured under Labour the political Right would be castigating them. It is easy to point the finger at the last Labour government but National have been the main party of government for 11 of the last 17 years.
In 2026 there needs to be clear emphasis on - supporting parenting and child development for 0 - 5s. Working much more effectively to get the missing 10,000 enrolled and hugely increasingly regular attendance (a bence-mark could be England’s 75%). Placing a great deal more emphasis on keeping students in school until 17 and lifting all qualfications levels for current high-school students (not just hoping for possible Primary schooling to drift through in future years). And, getting the taxpayer resources for education into the right places.
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 sourced HERE
5 comments:
I teach at university and I'd say the gap in ability between top and bottom students is at least 50 times. What explains that gap? (Probably I'm to blame).
No child at school, then no child benefit, no benefit of any kind. No problem!! There is a weapon against non attendance, use it.
Anon 345: "... gap in ability between top and bottom students is at least 50 times."
Unreal. This means that on a 0-100 scale some come in at 100 or 99 and some at 2. What kinds of assessments are you using, for goodness sake?
Anon 842: I'd go a step further and prosecute parents of truants for parental negligence. Heavy fines mean less money for the pub and ciggies so you'd see some action pronto.
One term in office is not going to solve educational issues that have taken 40 years to fall apart. Getting parents on board will be a very slow process especially those whose aspirations only go as far as getting dole $$$.
As I have stated , probably ad nauseam ,my mother Doris Ferry, taught 1500, remedial students privately to read in a decile 9-10 suburb.These students had been well nurtured as is characteristic of professional and middle class parents but still they had failed to learn to read because the teaching methods in the local schools were disastrously wrong.
I suggest Alwyn reads the article posted on BV , last Feb12 ,'26 on the 'Mississippi Literacy Miracle.' Just changing to explicitly taught phonics changed this impoverished US state from 50th to 9th in state reading scores. Achieving in literacy lifted all other areas of schooling.But it took one or two decades to see the improved results.
Alwyn is making a serious mistake , in my view, not to acknowledge, that, the revolutionary changes Standford is making to improve our wrecked education system, ( Just look at PERLS results ) will take time to be manifest.
It will also take time for parents and children to gain confidence in NZ primary schools as places of real learning not, places of destructive and ineffective teaching methods, entertainment centers or social engineering. This is what they had become until Erica implemented the changes. Gaynor
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