School Lines Like it or lump it? Lester Flockton
Feedback, feedforward, feedup, feeddown lester.flockton@otago.ac.nz
When Mr Key announced his political party’s education policy a matter of a days before voters went to the ballot box, with the then Minister of Education standing behind him and clearly on the way out in favour of a party member with some credentials, intellectual agility and at least a modicum of charm, it was too late for any discussion, justification, explanation, debate or challenge (the backbone stuff of good democratic process). It was a matter of what we should expect, like it or lump it. So, what are the likes, and what are the lumps? Well, that probably depends on your beliefs about the direction in which education is heading in New Zealand, and what excites you most as an educational leader. Is it the prospect of a share of the $1 billion that will be spent to ‘modernise and transform’ schools for the 21st century, or the ‘bedding in’ of National Standards, or the strengthening of teacher and principal accountability and performance ‘measurement’? These are just a few of the government’s priorities announced in its election manifesto last November. Or is it something that doesn’t appear to have found a place or mention among the priorities – like giving children a rich, well-rounded education that is squarely based on the New Zealand Curriculum, and where the main measure of success is children’s enthusiastic engagement in learning across all of its dimensions – something not readily captured by numeric ‘data’. The government’s 2011 education policy manifesto (Education in Schools: Building better public services), with its 13 ‘What we will do next’ categories and 42 specific actions, is an interesting contrast to its 3 policy priorities in 2008. They were fundamentally the introduction of National Standards in reading, writing and mathematics: plain language reporting to parents, and public data reporting in relation to the standards. It is clearly pleased to tell those who read electioneering stuff that this policy is working, as described in its election case study: A decile 4 full primary school in the South Island had a charter that included a reading target. As they worked towards the target, the school identified a significant number of six-year-olds not meeting the National Standard in reading. As a result, the school was identified as suitable to participate in an accelerated learning programme for literacy. After staff training, the school engaged with parents about he programme through face-to-face discussions and a letter that identified the students’ current reading level in relation to the National Standard. The accelerated learning programme was put in place and all children made significant improvements in their reading.
The Principal said that they could ‘not believe the rate of acceleration over the term. The students are now engaged and loving their reading.’ Since the name of the school and all other relevant information necessary for validating or critiquing the story are not given, we might reasonably assume that it is fiction! Nonetheless, it very neatly spins together all of the key ingredients of the silver bullet – targets, standards, staff training, accelerated learning, ‘significant improvement’, reporting to parents, and an incredulous school principal! But if these sorts of stories are to hold any water and be regarded as anything more than propaganda, then we should expect to have full access to all of the evidence and, with time, year-by-year evidence to show that improvement is sustained and continued as the children move through their schooling – not just when they were six. Without this, an isolated case study from one school in over 2000 is worthless and unconvincing. National Standards aside, the other numerous policy directions announced by the government last November cover a wide spectrum of initiatives. Some are remarkably similar to those that the Ministry of Education has been driving at for some time (e.g. Focus on building the capability of teachers, principals and boards to use data to inform teaching practice; Building strong and informed connections between families and schools). Some are a sharpening of the wedge that has been foreshadowed by Ministry behaviour over the latter part of last year (e.g. Having education agencies actively engaging when schools are identified as potentially failing students; Improve reporting of system-level performance, including investigating school-level reporting). Other policies, however, signal new directions (Have more effective teacher and principal appraisal; Ensure capable school leadership by requiring selection and training of new principals). On the surface, many of the policies may seem progressive or remedial of system problems. The detail and language of the policies does, however, leave one wondering whose ideas they are, and who put them together. Regardless, we have learned from National Standards that everything will depend largely on how the Ministry crafts or engineers them for implementation, realising that Sewell has gone and a new Secretary of Education is at her desk, and Tolley has gone and a new Minister of Education is at the helm. Optimistic? Confident? That may depend on what kind of educational thinker and leader you are! Reference New Zealand Government (2011). Education in Schools: Building better public services. Available at: www.national.org.nz/PDF…/Education_in_ Schools_policy.pdf