Alwyn Poole
Things have been trending very badly in our education system for the last twenty years. Through an increasingly simplistic and low bar NCEA system we have been able to pretend that progress is being made. However, the gaps between low decile, Maori and Pasifika students as compared to Asian, European and high decile students have not closed in any meaningful way. In terms of international measures, New Zealand has gone from near the top of OECD indicators to near the bottom in maths, reading and science. No one now seriously calls our system “World Class”.
A “water divide” is a place where rain can hit either side of a range and by doing so end up with two significantly different destinations. Probably the most famous is the Continental Divide from Alaska down to Mexico. Depending on where the rain lands, one side takes the water to the Pacific, the other to the Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico or the Arctic Ocean. For a molecule of water this is clearly not a big deal. When humans are, metaphorically, divided in this way it is life-defining.
Leading into 2021 New Zealand schools were in a long-term perilous and largely ineffective position for many students. At the most aspirational high school level, University Entrance, Asian graduates were nearly 30% ahead of European school leavers and with a near 70% success rate compared with approximately 20% for Maori and Pasifika students. Decile 1 to 3 students (where most Maori and Pasifika are) were attending less (30% to 70% full attendance) and leaving earlier, and were rarely going into degree level study that promised high remuneration. This was the status quo.
This year things have changed – and very much for the worse. In the political sphere, people like to talk about head or tail winds. The NZ education system is all headwind at present – with the exception of shining examples such as the Catholic school system, outliers such as Manukura and the ever present very high quality and inspirational teachers who exist in every school.
In the last few weeks, it has become evident that there has been huge disengagement in Auckland. With many adults choosing to withdraw from the labour force (i.e. not being willing and able to work at current wages), teens have filled the gaps. This has meant that they are not returning to school in the critical fourth term. Auckland wide last week the attendance percentage for Years 11–13 was approximately 35%. Once you are earning the minimum wage and it seems like a lot, aspiration and delayed gratification take a back seat. That is especially true when extended family begin to rely on what you are bringing in.
The mandate for teachers to get vaccinated will hammer the low decile schools. There will be gaps from decile 1 to decile 10 but the wealthier schools will work out ways to incentivise their places and act as a suction pump for staff from poorer districts. The anecdotes from the education sector tell not only of the loss of a significant number of qualified teachers but also a very significant loss of teacher aides and administrative staff. Now that it is widely known that double-vaxxed people can catch and pass on the virus, we need to work out that it is more important to know if staff are ill than if they are vaccinated.
Term 4 of 2021 is very important for the Year 11 to 13 cohorts. Many families would have provided great care and inspiration for their children during this time. Some schools have done a high-quality job of keeping their students fully engaged. However, I am very worried about the spread of academic results across the sector. The Ministry of Education seem very laid back and I have only seen “Covid updates” from their leadership – as opposed to education inspiration.
The urgent next step is working out 2022. Schools are saying that education is just not in the mindset of many families at present. In some areas enrolments in the primary-intermediate-secondary transitions are way behind normal numbers for this time of the year. Where is the emphasis on telling many children to take a “Mulligan” and repeat a year for great results? Where are the programmes to significantly improve attendance and enhance academic aspiration? What are we doing about the more than 10,000 students that are not enrolled anywhere?
It seems to me that in the last 2 years we have gathered up the aspirations of thousands of kids, mashed those dreams into a truck, and driven it off a cliff. From “bad to worse” for our system is euphemistic.
PS. We have two beautiful places in the Bay of Islands for guests. www.baylight.co.nz and www.titorelodge.co.nz If BDF people contact me to come and stay we will take 10% off our price and give 5% of what we get to The BFD.