A New Broom in Town

Cheering From the Terraces

OK, let's be honest.  Government schools in New Zealand are really union controlled schools.  We refer, of course, to the teacher and principals' unions: the NZEI, the PPTA, and the NZ Principals' Federation.  Long ago these entities decided that they were the experts in education and operating schools.  Consequently they assumed the mantle of being a second-guessing critic of all government educational policies. 

To be sure there are plenty of teachers in the government education system who are dedicated professionals and are really focused upon kids.  On the other hand, far too many have been brain-washed in pedagogic theory that can best be described as "unteaching".
  Less is more.  The less you teach, the more educated the child will become--or so prevailing pedagogic theory has it.  We are not kidding.  It's called constructivist pedagogy--the now dominant theory which advocates as little top-down curriculum content as possible and as much learning constructed by the child themselves as practicable.  Teachers are facilitators, not instructors.

People who oppose such enlightened views are ignorant troglodytes on the purlieu of humanity.  The teachers unions (and far too many government educrats warming seats in the Ministry of Education) are the illuminati who alone understand this.  Naturally, when these self-duped higher beings have to cope with a Minister of Education and with a government which has a different view, by definition their opponents are seen as ignorant, destructive, anti-education, and reactionary.

Into this mess came National Standards--the idea that every child would be tested every year for their proficiency in reading, writing, and maths.  Horror.  A six-inch gun had just fired across the rusting bows of constructivist idiocy.  For the past three years we have witnessed a guerrilla campaign waged by the unions against the introduction, and now application, of National Standards testing.

The previous Minister of Education, Anne Tolley was pilloried and spat upon from one end of the country to the other.  We have no doubt that many a voodoo doll festooned with pins beyond number lies in the dark cupboards and wardrobes of our educational illuminati, dragged out in closed union meetings.  In fact, we have it on good authority that meetings of local union chapters have introduced a "closed session" component which involves everyone present inserting needles into a voodoo doll--a ritual is known as Tolleying. 

No doubt the controllers of the government school system heaved a huge sigh of relief when Anne Tolley was replaced by Hekia Parata--a novice.  It raises more than a belly laugh to see the union spluttering and dribbling now that it has dawned on them that whereas Tolley had a hide of a Neanderthal, Parata seems to have the hide and teeth of a T-Rex and, worse, is on the hunt.

The latest stoush is over whether the government will publish the results of school testing so that the whole wide world can rank schools as to how effective they are in teaching really advanced and obscure subjects like reading, writing and arithmetic.  This has always been a big beef with the educational illuminati: if you are going to test whatever else you do, don't publish the results!  Why?  It will harm the children.  Spare us!

Tolley equivocated on the issue.  (To be fair, it was probably a battle for another day--like now.) 

Enter Hekia Parata.  She shows every sign of spoiling for a fight from the moment her Ministerial Warrant was issued.  This, according to the NZ Herald:

New Education Minister Hekia Parata and the primary teachers' union, the NZEI, could be on an early collision course over league tables comparing schools.  Not only has the minister rejected the union's calls to prevent the compilation of tables using national standards reporting data, she may get the Ministry of Education to compile official league tables.

She indicated they could compare schools in the same decile grouping [one to 10], as happens in Australia.
"We invest billions of dollars in the education sector and New Zealanders are entitled to know what value we are getting for that money," the minister said yesterday.  "That means having accurate information available."
Parents placed a lot of trust in principals and teachers, she said.  "And that trust should be returned by letting parents know accurate information about what's happening."

She said making information available is part of the democratic tradition in New Zealand and was one she wanted to see continue.

Hekia Parata talked favourably about the Australian website Myschool [Myschool.edu.au], which compares statistically similar schools in reading, writing, spelling, grammar and punctuation, and numeracy against national testing, and also records a school's progress in lifting achievement.  Asked if she would consider getting the Ministry of Education to set up a similar website to the one in Australia, she said: "I would consider that, yes".

All power to you, Minister.  Go for it.  Sunlight is the best disinfectant.