Strategy Needs More Certainty For Schools

Strategy Needs To Provide More Certainty For Schools

Members who belong to the country’s largest education union, NZEI Te Riu Roa, hope the Government’s Schooling Strategy launched today will provide more certainty in medium term education policy for schools.

Education Minister, Trevor Mallard launched the Strategy “Making a Bigger Difference For All Students” at Newlands Intermediate in Wellington. It identifies three priorities for schools for the next five years which are: all students to experience effective learning; this learning to be nurtured by their families and whanau and all school staff to further engage with evidence to inform their practice.

“If this schooling strategy provides greater consistency, certainty and coherence in terms of education policy for our schools, then NZEI members will welcome it,” says NZEI Te Riu Roa National President, Colin Tarr.

“We need to move from the continual tweaking and tinkering of the schools sector that has been an unwelcome feature for the last 15 years.”

“School staff want a coherent medium term approach to education policy and hope the strategy will provide this.”

NZEI members wholeheartedly support the strategy’s core goal of enabling all children to achieve their full potential but say schools must have the resourcing they require to achieve this goal.

“Without good levels of centrally provided investment, public schools are severely compromised in what they can achieve,” says Colin Tarr.

“There must be a genuine spirit of trust and professional accountability among all those working in education so that all public schools are well resourced and supported to ensure they can meet the increasingly diverse needs of all their learners.”

We must also recognise that the strategy’s goals can not be achieved by schools alone.

“Schools are part of the communities they serve. This strategy must be aligned with other government, school and community initiatives to ensure we are helping all children achieve their full potential,” says Colin Tarr.

ENDS

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