Competitive education

Comparisons can help human beings, a competitive species, strive to do better - whether in NCEA pass rates or scholarship numbers or in provincial education correlations.

They give schools and communities the chance for pride, often well earned, or for motivation to do better next time.

Sometimes, too, they provide opportunities for finding reasons, often valid, why performances are down the scale. Even if bald results taken at face value can be misleading, they are a part of the information mix.

NCEA statistics for Otago schools were published last week, limitations and all.

As expected, schools able to pick and choose their pupils, the same schools likely to attract children from wealthier backgrounds, have the most impressive looking outcomes.

Hopefully, most readers and parents understand these schools' headstarts and take that into account when making judgements.

The surprise would come if they failed to do extremely well, especially given the likely elevated initial level of most pupils entering them.

By contrast, schools drawing from lower decile areas as well as small country schools, where many talented pupils have left to board in town, cannot be expected to reach the same pass rates.

It is value they add to individual pupils that counts; that is what they achieve with their range of raw material.

When they do reasonably that, indeed, can be a source of pride and an indication to parents of success.

Intriguingly, while the sample was too small (nine and four) for any strong conclusions, Lawrence Area School gained 100% pass rates for both NCEA level 1 and 2.

Discerning parents will also realise that girls' schools have advantages because NCEA's style suits girls, on the whole, much better than boys.

Parents might also realise there is more to education than just pass rates and that some schools, even allowing for decile ratings, have more than their share of pupils likely to struggle in formal testing or who are involved in other programmes.

How schools structure and select their courses makes a difference.

The figures show Otago itself doing well, with 17 of the 27 secondary schools in the region matching or beating the national average pass rate for level 3 NCEA.

That sounds praiseworthy and might well be so. But given that all Otago high schools are at least decile 4, surely that is to be expected.

It might also be, though, that in the South far more pupils, and therefore many who would be less academic, stay at school longer. This could drag pass rates down.

Given that almost all Otago schools were ahead of the national average at level 1, some explanation like this makes sense.

The lesson here is to remain wary of these types of statistics.

Otago appears to have achieved satisfactorily in scholarship (level 4 NCEA).