Tolley can’t have it both ways

Education Minister Anne Tolley can’t have it both ways ---- saying she’s disappointed some schools are just reporting on reading, writing and mathematics standards, though that’s what she told them to do, says Labour Education spokesperson Trevor Mallard.

“Anne Tolley is the one who sent them a reporting template, asking them to report on reading, writing and mathematics standards,” Trevor Mallard said. “That was the limit of her vision.

“But now parents are telling her they want more than her limited vision --- that, to use her own words, they want to know ‘all of the things their kids are doing’ --- she is turning on schools who have been following her own template to the letter.

“No wonder parents are confused, unsure whether to blame schools or Anne Tolley and the National Government for the narrow and shallow information they are receiving,” Trevor Mallard said.

“No wonder more and more schools are becoming angry at the level of disloyalty Anne Tolley is showing.

“She is inflicting more and more work on them, firstly imposing national standards without providing the professional support and training they need, and now she’s asking them to go over and beyond her own template, and castigating them when they don’t or can’t do it.”

Trevor Mallard said: “In many ways Anne Tolley cuts a tragic figure. She doesn’t understand exactly what she’s asking schools to do, she doesn’t know what the standards are really supposed to achieve, and she certainly doesn’t understand that in most cases trained teachers certainly know better than she does.

“The real tragedy, however, will be the legacy she leaves behind --- disgruntled schools and teachers, increasing numbers of unhappy parents, and students who find themselves enrolled in a political experiment rather than in the education system they deserve.”

http://assessment.tki.org.nz/Reporting-to-parents-families-and-whanau/Examples-and-templates/Templates

ENDS

© Scoop Media