Latest news with #EducationReviewOffice
Scoop
13-05-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
Getting Kids Back In School
Press Release – New Zealand Government Frontline attendance services will be more accountable, better at effectively managing cases, and data driven in their responses. To achieve this, they will soon have access to a new case management system and better data monitoring and their … Associate Minister of Education Frontline attendance services will receive a significant funding boost so they can support more schools and reach double the students, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. Budget 2025 includes a $140 million package to improve attendance over the next four years. This includes around $123 million for the delivery of a new attendance service and almost $17 million to support and strengthen frontline attendance services. 'Frontline attendance services will be more accountable, better at effectively managing cases, and data driven in their responses. To achieve this, they will soon have access to a new case management system and better data monitoring, and their contracts will be more closely monitored,' Mr Seymour says. 'In 2024 the Education Review Office (ERO) completed a report into attendance services which found that the system designed to get students back in school was ineffective and required substantial reform. For example, the current system fails to consistently improve student attendance because funding varies between providers. Many services are under resourced and cannot meet demand. The 2024 ERO report made four recommendations for a successful new attendance service: Having effective targeted supports in place to address chronic absence Increasing the focus on retaining students on their return Putting in place an efficient and effective model Strengthening how we prevent students becoming chronically absent. 'The new attendance services model addresses the first three recommendations. The wider attendance action plan, which includes the requirement for schools to have their own attendance management plan, aligned with the Stepped Attendance Response (STAR) in place by Term 1 of 2026, will address all four,' Mr Seymour says. 'Service providers will work with families, local communities and social agencies to deliver comprehensive services. The level of service provided will depend on the need. It will range from advice and support to schools, to intensive case management of students. 'Schools with the highest numbers of chronically absent students will be able to apply for funding for an in-school service. The schools in this bracket tend to be ones in higher Equity Index (EQI) groups, facing the most socio-economic barriers.' Transitioning to the new Attendance Service will begin at the end of this year and the new services will become fully operational from early 2026. The Ministry of Education will work with providers to ensure the transition is smooth, and that students continue to receive the services they need during this period. 'Attending school is the first step towards achieving positive educational outcomes. Positive educational outcomes lead to better health, higher incomes, better job stability and greater participation within communities. These are opportunities that every student deserves,' Mr Seymour says.
Scoop
13-05-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
Getting Kids Back In School
Associate Minister of Education Frontline attendance services will receive a significant funding boost so they can support more schools and reach double the students, Associate Education Minister David Seymour says. Budget 2025 includes a $140 million package to improve attendance over the next four years. This includes around $123 million for the delivery of a new attendance service and almost $17 million to support and strengthen frontline attendance services. 'Frontline attendance services will be more accountable, better at effectively managing cases, and data driven in their responses. To achieve this, they will soon have access to a new case management system and better data monitoring, and their contracts will be more closely monitored,' Mr Seymour says. 'In 2024 the Education Review Office (ERO) completed a report into attendance services which found that the system designed to get students back in school was ineffective and required substantial reform. For example, the current system fails to consistently improve student attendance because funding varies between providers. Many services are under resourced and cannot meet demand. The 2024 ERO report made four recommendations for a successful new attendance service: Having effective targeted supports in place to address chronic absence Increasing the focus on retaining students on their return Putting in place an efficient and effective model Strengthening how we prevent students becoming chronically absent. 'The new attendance services model addresses the first three recommendations. The wider attendance action plan, which includes the requirement for schools to have their own attendance management plan, aligned with the Stepped Attendance Response (STAR) in place by Term 1 of 2026, will address all four,' Mr Seymour says. 'Service providers will work with families, local communities and social agencies to deliver comprehensive services. The level of service provided will depend on the need. It will range from advice and support to schools, to intensive case management of students. 'Schools with the highest numbers of chronically absent students will be able to apply for funding for an in-school service. The schools in this bracket tend to be ones in higher Equity Index (EQI) groups, facing the most socio-economic barriers.' Transitioning to the new Attendance Service will begin at the end of this year and the new services will become fully operational from early 2026. The Ministry of Education will work with providers to ensure the transition is smooth, and that students continue to receive the services they need during this period. 'Attending school is the first step towards achieving positive educational outcomes. Positive educational outcomes lead to better health, higher incomes, better job stability and greater participation within communities. These are opportunities that every student deserves,' Mr Seymour says.
NZ Herald
12-05-2025
- Politics
- NZ Herald
Critics slam Government move to remove ECE cultural obligations
Minister for Regulation David Seymour said the changes are to 'streamline' operational requirements and reduce the regulatory burden on centres, but opponents said it amounted to recolonisation. 'Initially I was angry,' said Hawke's Bay-based Kaiako Penina Ria (Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāti Pārau). 'Not just for myself, but for my ancestors and whānau that fought for us to be recognised as tangata whenua. From that point of view, it feels like we're starting all over again.' Ria said the proposed law change reminded her of the stories she had heard from her grandparents and great-grandparents about how they were treated by the education system. Assimilation enforced by the Native Schools Act in 1867 saw schooling conducted entirely in English, with the curriculum skewed towards instruction in manual and domestic skills. Mātauranga Māori and cultural practices were sidelined, and for decades, Māori were also punished for speaking te reo Māori at school, contributing to the loss of the language and deepening educational inequities. 'Our whānau went through so much so we could have the future that they wanted. I feel like it's important that we carry that on for them, and also for our future generations,' Ria said. Currently, ECE centres must meet minimum standards set by the Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008. The review recommended that only 26 of the current 98 licensing criteria be retained in full with the rest amended, merged, downgraded or removed. 'The Government is addressing ECE regulations to ensure child safety is priority number one, children's education is number two, and parental choice is number three,' Seymour said. 'The ethnic background of the child shouldn't have any bearing on this, and providers shouldn't be forced to worry about the Treaty when their priorities are keeping children safe and educating.' Academic research has previously highlighted the importance of children feeling secure and supported in their culture. 'There is little doubt that a secure cultural identity is essential for wellbeing and for educational and societal participation and success. It is a key factor in people's sense of self and their relationships with others,' a report commissioned by the Education Review Office (ERO) said. Ria said for preschool children, acknowledging culture included using waiata, karakia, speaking te reo Māori, and teaching of purākau (traditional Māori stories). 'We value where they come from, we learn about their whakapapa and what's important to them, a lot of recognition of who they are, their uniqueness. 'Working in mainstream and seeing the importance for tamariki Māori, to know where they come from and learn about their heritage. To me, that's important, it's something that I wish I would've had when I was younger.' While there was a focus on te ao Māori, ECE centres also support other cultures, such as celebrating the start of Chinese Lunar New Year. Kirikiriroa Hamilton-based kaiako and NZEI Te Riu Roa Early Childhood representative Zane McCarthy said that while his centre will likely opt to keep the bicultural aspects, he worried some centres would drop them altogether. 'There are bad actors. There are bad apples and poor employers who will quash it. It's basically colonisation again.' McCarthy was particularly concerned about the private centres, which he said made up around 75% of the sector. 'A lot of that 75% have profit-driven motives. When you've got a teacher workforce who are crying out for professional development to learn about te ao Māori, they're needing support in order to uphold te Tiriti and mokopuna Māori. But that comes at a cost, and so when you've got profit-driven motives, they're going to look to scrap that aspect in order to make the bottom line look better.' He said there have been big benefits of the cultural requirements in the past. 'Whānau have learned, have grown and learnt alongside their tamariki, when they're coming home with new kupu, waiata, purākau, that they're learning from them, and they're becoming even bolder in their own culture and identity as well.' Green Party MP and spokesperson for ECE Benjamin Doyle said the move prioritised corporate greed and profit over public good and wellbeing. 'There will be some private ECE owners who are looking to make a profit over everything else, and so they'll see that as an unnecessary thing to do anymore, because it's not related to their licensing, they'll just opt not to.' Doyle said celebrating culture and identity can make Māori learners feel seen. 'When they are nurtured by waiata and purākau, when they are nurtured by those values of manaakitanga and whānaungatanga, it increases their hauora, their wellbeing. And that is not intangible, right? It's tangible.' By taking the current requirements away, Doyle said, the evidence shows tamariki Māori will not thrive. 'Learning does not occur. It cannot occur when we do not celebrate identity and culture. So it will have a huge impact on our tamariki. And we know that when tamariki thrive, whānau thrive, and if tamariki are suffering, whānau suffer.' The Early Childhood Council represents childcare centre owners and managers in the ECE sector, speaking for more than 1500 centres across Aotearoa. Early Childhood Council chief executive Simon Laube said he was not concerned the change would result in a lack of acknowledgement of children's culture, and questioned whether they should have even been a requirement for centres to open in the first place. 'Was it really right to give it to a service provider as a regulation?' Responding to the argument that private providers will prioritise profit over the wellbeing of children, Laube said that was not the reality he saw day-to-day. 'We spend our time trying to support providers who can't actually pay their current costs of business so they are not profitable and that's a strong kind of trend across the sector. It's quite hard to even really engage with that argument properly, because we're struggling to just keep our centres going with what the current expectations are.' Removing requirements around cultural aspects would not even necessarily result in cost-savings, Laube said. 'If you really do think about it in terms of business costs, what could they save money on there? You still need to have resources for learning, would they not have language in them? Would they not have people in them? Would that not include culture? It's very hard to cut out culture from a people-based industry.' Cabinet has accepted the recommendations, and Seymour will introduce the Education and Training (Early Childhood Education Reform) Amendment Bill in July.
NZ Herald
05-05-2025
- Business
- NZ Herald
Education Minister Erica Stanford visits Whanganui to meet teachers and principals
'The people themselves are extraordinary. 'They are responsible for a huge number of schools and, quite often, they spend a lot of time driving between schools and not enough time in classrooms.' She said she was looking at using their skills differently, with 'some big announcements at the Budget'. While the uncertainty was difficult and a tricky situation for teachers, there would be opportunities for them, Stanford said. 'We are trying to get resources directly into classrooms and working with children. 'There are a number of things to come, and I think [teachers] will feel very comfortable in the next month or so.' The Budget will be delivered on May 22. In March, Whanganui resource teacher of literacy Nicky Collins said she supported making the service more equitable, but that meant improving it, not cutting it. 'We'll just have to see what happens but this is critical for those children that struggle the most,' Collins said. 'I'm still running multiple workshops every term. All those sorts of programmes will just be gone.' Meanwhile, Stanford said the Government's decision to introduce economic literacy classes for Years 1 to 10, starting next year, was something parents had been calling for. 'You learn a lot of stuff at school that is interesting and might lead to a career, but isn't something that will help you in your everyday life,' she said. 'It would be nice to say that we could leave it up to parents to do, but this has been ongoing for such a long time that parents haven't had that education themselves.' Figures from January for the Manawatū-Whanganui region showed 73.4% of students stayed at school until they were 17, and a decade previously it was 83.4%. Stanford said students should be staying at secondary school and the Government was working to make changes to NCEA - 'three years of high-stakes assessments'. Last November, the Education Review Office's head of Education Evaluation Centre, Ruth Shinoda, said most countries did not have assessments across all three years (11, 12 and 13). 'If we keep NCEA Level 1, we need to reduce flexibility so there is more consistency and students don't miss out on key knowledge, and reduce variability so different subjects and assessments are an equal amount of work and difficulty,' Shinoda said. Stanford said if students were going to leave after Year 11, they should still have good literacy, numeracy, English and maths skills. 'If you are going to leave into the workforce or into further training, what do you need? 'Those are the considerations we are looking at.' The minister said speaking directly to teachers was her 'absolute favourite thing in the world' and she would spend most of her time in Whanganui doing that. 'We are indicating a system reform, and it's all very well for me to stand up and say 'we are going to do this',' she said. 'The people who implement it on the ground are our principals, who lead the change in schools, and our teachers who do it every day in the classroom.' Mike Tweed is a multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle. Since starting in March 2020, he has dabbled in everything from sport to music. At present his focus is local government, primarily the Whanganui District Council.
Scoop
02-05-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
Raising Achievement & Closing The Equity Gap At School
Press Release – New Zealand Government The Governments ambitious changes reflect the responsibility we have to these children and young people, to ensure their experiences with our education system deliver consistent high-quality, services that set students up for future success. Minister of Education The Government is continuing to raise achievement and close the equity gap in schools across the country, so all Kiwi kids have the knowledge, skills and competencies they need to reach their full potential, Education Minister Erica Stanford says. The Governments' ambitious changes reflect the responsibility we have to these children and young people, to ensure their experiences with our education system deliver consistent high-quality, services that set students up for future success. As students start back at school this week for Term 2, they will benefit from: Cell phone use banned in schools so students can concentrate on their learning, An hour a day of reading, writing, and maths in primary and intermediate classrooms, A world-leading year-by-year, knowledge-rich, internationally comparable, evidence-based curriculum detailing what is taught and when in english and maths all the way from year 1 to year 13 with other subject areas underway. Over 836,000 maths resources for students and teachers in primary and intermediates to support the new maths curriculum, The mandated teaching of phonics and structured literacy so that every child gets the very best start when they learn to read, A phonics checks after 20 and 40 weeks at school to ensure that children's reading is on track and progressing, $3.2 million over 2025/2026 for tier 2 teachers to support readers who need extra help using structured literacy approaches.962 schools are benefitting from this investment, $3 million to support 3,000 Year 7-8 students to accelerate their learning with 12 weeks of math tutoring, 20,000 teachers having received high quality professional development in structured literacy and 15,000 have received training in structured maths, NCEA co-requisite literacy and numeracy supports reaching 9,100 kids. 'I've asked the Education Review Office (ERO) to track closely how well our new approaches are working, and the emerging findings are encouraging.' Ms Stanford says. ERO has found: Almost two-thirds of teachers say structured literacy approaches have already changed their teaching practices a lot. Half of teachers report that structured literacy approaches have improved student engagement a lot. Three-quarters of teachers say structured literacy approaches have improved literacy for most students. For maths, nearly 90 percent of monitored schools have appointed a lead for implementation. 'After the first term of implementing structured literacy approaches through the new national curriculum, this is a testament to the incredible work of our teachers. We know how important it is for our schools to be supported, which is why I've asked ERO to keep me updated to ensure that schools receive the support they need.' 'Everything we are doing in English medium schools we are providing in te reo Māori. No matter where you are in the country, parents can have confidence that this Government is putting the foundations in place for their child to reach their full potential at school,' 'We want Kiwi kids to learn in safe, warm and dry classrooms. It is crucial school property is delivered effectively and efficiently across the country so more students, teachers and communities benefit from suitable learning environments,' 'There has been a 35 percent increase in the number of standardised and repeatable designs, allowing us to reduce the price per classroom by 28 percent and built 137 more classrooms in 2024 than in 2023.' Ms Stanford says. Through the Government's decisive action to improve efficiency and performance in school property delivery, $100 million has been freed up to deliver new schools and more classrooms across the country in areas that have growing populations. 'Thank you to our amazing principals, teachers and support staff for your incredibly hard work in implementing this transformational system reform. Our plan is setting every child in New Zealand up for success and restoring ambition and achievement at the heart of the education system,' Ms Stanford says.
