It's Official: NCEA Is Fatally Flawed

Monday 30 Aug 2004

Deborah Coddington - Press Releases - Education

If the recent debacle over Cambridge High School isn't enough proof for Education Minister Trevor Mallard, then a weekend newspaper ad should finally convince him that the NCEA must go, ACT New Zealand Education Spokesman Deborah Coddington said today.

"None other than Otago University Education Faculty's Associate Professor Howard Lee has gone public with the truth that parents and teachers have known for months: NCEA is fatally flawed," Miss Coddington said.

"Professor Lee calls the system an 'experiment', and says that New Zealand children are 'guinea pigs'. These are exactly the words ACT has been using for years.

"NCEA is all about credits and nothing about knowledge. It is a funnel through which we attempt to force our brightest, middle and least able students in a socialist attempt to have them all come out the same.

"It doesn't work. It has never worked. It will never work, and ACT would allow schools to dump the NCEA. The last National Government introduced this system - despite it being totally discredited overseas. What would National do now?

"ACT will bring back standards and national exams so students, parents, universities and employers have a qualification they can trust," Miss Coddington said.

ENDS

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