Latest news with #AlwynPoole
Kiwiblog
4 days ago
- General
- Kiwiblog
Disengagement with the NZ state education system.
Not counting students/families opting for private, state integrated and designated character school options – there are five major features of our current enrolment and attendance in the NZ Education system that need sunlight. 1. Enrolments in Te Kura (formerly the Correspondence School) are now at 31,000 – a 32% increase since 2018. The achievement levels of this school are very low with 8.7% of leavers having UE. 2. Our attendance statistics remain in an incredibly poor state: – full attendance (90%) for all ethnicities in Term 4 2024 was 58% – full attendance for Maori was 44.1% – full attendance for Pasifika was 42.4% 3. There is a massive amount of students not enrolled anywhere at all … 'Figures released under the Official Information Act to Newstalk ZB show nearly 10,000 5 to 13-year-olds were not enrolled in the official school system as of 2022 – a significant jump from slightly more than 6300 reported in the year before.' Please note that the figure is just primary school students. 4. Home-school figures remain very high. 'At the middle of last year there were 10,757 children in homeschooling, about the same as in 2023 and not much less than 2022's all-time high of 10,899. Prior to the pandemic, homeschooling enrolments were increasing by 200-300 each year and in 2019 there were 6573 enrolments.' National are treating all of these problems with their heads in the sand and only making incremental changes that will have marginal effects – at best. 5. Retention until 17yo contiues to diminish. In 2023, 79 percent of school leavers remained at school until their 17th birthday. This is the lowest retention rate since 2013. Retention of senior students has dropped 6.4 percentage points since the peak rate in 2015. Alwyn Poole [email protected]
Kiwiblog
25-05-2025
- Politics
- Kiwiblog
In terms of Education – the two true marks of any good government budget is …
How much is spent in support of parents as the first and most important teacher of their child(ren)? … As opposed to bureaucracy/system for the sake of it because it has always been there. What portion of the education spend is for direcectly benefiting the child? … As opposed to bureaucracy/system for the sake of it because it has always been there. Despite HUGE promises to reduce the Ministry of Education 'head count' to 2,700 it is still over 4,200. A massive waste of tax-payer's money in these 'tough times'. This does not get challenged by National alligned entities such as the NZ Initiative and the Taxpayers Union because … they are National aligned. The sort of trivial incrementalism occuring for an education system that is truly in crises – would be thoroughly challenged by right-wing people if they happened under Labour/Greens. Given that well over $20billion will be allocated for education in NZ … I would assert that a truly focussed government/Minister – could shave at least a third off that … and improve outcomes and future productivity for our nation. Announcements like an extra $140m to improve attendance are nonsensical when you understand that that is 0.7% of Vote Education. i.e. Bugger all to do the most fundamental task of getting children to actually attend. Alwyn Poole [email protected]
Kiwiblog
14-05-2025
- Politics
- Kiwiblog
An impertinent question on the NACT search for low hanging fruit.
While bringing up my three wonderful children we had: no TV. no playstation. limited screen time to 30 minutes a day (which was hardly ever used). no cell-phones (I did not even have one until Feb 2024). read a massive amount of books. the two boys and a girl were/are high quality academics, all were active in sports (including one becoming a Queen's Guide – awarded by Jerry Mateparae). My – then wife – and I prioritised experiences for our family above aquiring assets. We made all of these decisions with minimal government interferance or assistance (i.e. none). One of the big, apparant, positives for National/ACT is being free from the 'nanny state'. I have no doubt that children and young people are threatened and negatively impacted by social-media. But – the priority should be empoweing parents through information … not trying to implement an external ban (that will be unworkable). Alwyn Poole [email protected]
