Govt's chance to heal rift with educators

The election result provides no mandate for dangerous education policies, writes NZEI national president Judith Nowotarski.

National's election win cannot be seen as a mandate to continue its systematic dismantling of our public education system.

On the contrary, the win now gives the Government a real opportunity to mend bridges with educators and listen to school communities.

Before the election, NZEI surveys showed a strong rejection of Government education policies by New Zealanders.

The polling showed nearly 90% of New Zealanders believed public schools needed more resources to support pupils with learning difficulties and additional needs, two-thirds thought class sizes were too high while more than half believed charter schools diverted taxpayer money away from urgent needs in mainstream schools and National Standards did not encourage learning because they labelled children as young as 6 as failures.

This term the Government has an opportunity to take an open mind and listen to the very good reasons why primary teachers and principals have overwhelmingly rejected its so-called flagship $359 million ''Investing in Educational Success'' (IES) - a policy that would put up to $40,000 extra a year into some of their pockets.

These are people who work in schools with children every day and, yes, they do know about education.

The IES policy fails two vital litmus tests. There is no evidence this approach will help pupils succeed and secondly, it is strongly opposed by teachers, parents and communities.

Otago Primary Principals' Association chairwoman Stephanie Madden said: ''We would far rather that the money be targeted towards initiatives that will have a direct impact on children's learning.''

 

Teachers and principals want the money spent on the urgent needs children have right now.

They want more support in the classroom to help struggling pupils and those with special needs.

They want to see small class sizes that would allow teachers to give pupils more individualised teaching.

High-quality early childhood education is vital for long-term success at school, especially for vulnerable children.

Teachers want to see more resourcing for real professional development, something that has been in rapid decline in recent years.

Primary teachers and principals already work collaboratively, both across schools and within schools, to improve pupil success.

They don't need don't need gold-plated pay rises for a few ''leaders''. Moreover, the ''Investing in Educational Success'' model's proposed singling out of a few for big pay increases is seen by many as anti-collegial.

Some of the most prominent voices against the IES policy have come from principals who are already effective collaborators but see the IES proposal as a one-size-fits-all, top-down costly corporate model that will give big rewards to a few individuals but will not necessarily boost pupil success.

The plan proposed by the Government removes the ''best teachers'' from the classrooms two days a week.

Ironically, while the Government was secretly hatching the IES, the Ministry of Education and NZEI had been developing a new career pathway aimed at keeping great teachers in the classroom, based on real evidence of great teaching practice.

The new Advanced Classroom Expertise Teacher scheme was launched earlier this year and is being rolled out around the country.

What really matters is how the money is spent.

Parents, teachers and principals firmly believe the needs of special education pupils, the return of 100% qualified teachers in early childhood education, more funding put into resourcing school support staff, more resources for professional development, and the resourcing of existing and new forms of collaboration is where that money should go.

That will really count.

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