Alwyn Poole
Awyn Poole founded and was the head of Mt Hobson Middle School in Auckland for 18 years. MH Academy is now an in person private school for Year 11-13. There is now a nationwide online provision called Mt Hobson Academy Connected for Years 1-13.
Unless you live in the proverbial cave you know that education in NZ is in deep trouble.
- Nearly 10,000 students not enrolled anywhere.
- Just over 50 per cent of those students who are enrolled regularly attending. Thirty-eight per cent of Maori students.
- Twenty-four per cent of Maori leaving school without even Level 1 NCEA.
- Huge ethnic and socio-economic disparities.
- Massive achievement spreads: eg UE for leavers from a high of 97 per cent to one quarter of schools seeing their students to that qualification at a rate less than 20 per cent.
- A ‘curriculum’ refresh that is already a disaster and included a bizarre sexuality curriculum intended to be imposed into every subject area and deeply intrusive to families.
- Literacy testing for new math and literacy NCEA credits show high levels of failure that if implemented on time (ie 2024) would have seen 50 per cent of students fail Level 1 NCEA (90 per cent of decile one students).
- A massively overblown Ministry of Education (2,700 to 4,200 bureaucrats over the last four years) that is not fit for purpose in any way and is increasingly losing the confidence of the sector.
- A Minister who is at least in as much disarray as the sector she has responsibility for.
Labour’s solution? Bricks and mortar – four news schools and 300 new classrooms – when students are families are running for the hills due to the quality of teaching and learning in many of our schools.
The PPTA response? The ship is going down so let’s grab all we can while we can and the kids can get stuffed (who cares about their qualifications – it is not like they are already hamstrung by the government’s Covid response).
“The Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA) says its members voted overwhelmingly against the ministry’s offer [because the executive told them to] of three pay rises over two years plus a $4500 payment.
“Members have given national executive and the negotiating teams a clear mandate to seek a better offer that meets the pressing needs of secondary education and the secondary teaching profession,” PPTA Te Wehengarua acting president Chris Abercrombie said in a statement.
Primary teachers settled their ongoing contract dispute this week, but the union for secondary teachers had been recommending its members reject their offer.
The offer PPTA members rejected was almost identical to what primary school teachers belonging to the Educational Institute accepted.
Union members also voted to continue industrial action.
For the next three weeks – the rest of Term 2 – PPTA members will not teach two year levels each day from Monday to Thursday, nor attend meetings or respond to emails outside regular school hours.
None of this will solve the qualitative and quantitative teacher shortage as the PPTA executive’s moaning and actions make the sector far less desirable for aspirational and well qualified young people.
Families are looking for high-quality alternatives where teachers [are of] very high quality and are there everyday, the curriculum is high quality, there is flexibility befitting education in 2023, the families are highly valued and the children achieve.
I no longer am involved but Mt Hobson Academy Connected is a good option wherever you are in New Zealand. None of the teachers are union members and they are NEVER on strike – ie they put the children first – and the staff is of the highest quality and the curriculum is first class.