NZ Principal Magazine Term 3 2015

September 2015 Volume 30, Number 3

NZPF Conference 2015 Wellington

Also

featuring

• Stoke School, Nelson • Tribute to NZPF Kaumatua, Tauri Morgan

• EDUCANZ Researched • Opinion: Tuakana/Teina Relationships

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CONTENTS

Editor Liz Hawes Executive Officer PO Box 25380 Wellington 6146 Ph: 04 471 2338 Fax: 04 471 2339 Email: esm@nzpf.ac.nz

September 2015

2 EDITORIAL 3 PRESIDENT’S PEN 7 EDUCANZ Researched

Professor John O’Neill, Massey University

Magazine Proof-reader Helen Kinsey-Wightman Editorial Board Denise Torrey, NZPF President Geoff Lovegrove, Retired Principal, Feilding Liz Hawes, Editor Advertising

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24 Tribute to NZPF Kaumatua, Tauri Morgan Liz Hawes, Editor

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Note The articles in New Zealand Principal do not necessarily reflect the policy of the New Zealand Principals’ Federation. Readers are welcome to use or reprint material if proper acknowledgement is made.

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NZPF Conference 2015

Liz Hawes, Editor

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Stoke School, Nelson

Liz Hawes, Editor

SCHOOL LINES

Lester Flockton

OPINION: Tuakana/Teina relationships as a basis for school improvement Helen Kinsey-Wightman

ibc MARKETPLACE SECTION Profiles from education product and service providers

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Stoke School, Nelson

MAGAZINE

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Editorial Liz Hawes

Editor

Many principals who attended the 2015 conference in Wellington have said that the programme was truly outstanding from beginning to end. I would agree and would add that much of the success was due to the clever way the programme was constructed around the theme of seeing education through different lenses.

The lenses could well have been renamed as day and night lenses given the deep dark and frightening messages some speakers delivered and the bright, optimistic messages that emanated from others, particularly some of our New Zealand researchers.

NZPF President, Denise Torrey has covered the more sinister topic of privatising public education by stealth (p. 3), but in an act of unrestrained optimism, I choose to be inspired by Professor Angus MacFarlane.

MacFarlane presented a beautifully crafted picture of the history of education for Māori in New Zealand up to the modern day. It wasn’t a jolly story. It placed Māori firmly in the lower classes, disempowered and marginalised. He told us that educational expectations were set lower for Māori compared to Pakeha and these lower expectations would ensure Māori would remain located at the bottom end of society. This was not necessarily an overt process of deliberate discrimination, he explained, but rather happened as if it was the perfectly natural and normal way to be and how Māori would want it to be. This hegemonic force would prove viciously detrimental to prospects for Māori for many decades to come. At the same time, Māori were convinced that the way to advance in this new world was to learn English and Pakeha ways and keep Māori culture and language at home. Schools and education systems then were as he put it ‘culturally deprived’.

More recently the lens has turned again on Māori only this time our expectations are different. We now want Māori to succeed at exactly the same rate as their Pakeha peers. Educators everywhere welcome this new emphasis. It’s just the small matter of undoing a century and a half of ingrained institutional racism and cultural deprivation that is the problem.

MacFarlane is not deterred by the weight of this challenge and looks to the new wave of researchers coming through and establishing culturally relevant pedagogies. Many of them are researchers here in New Zealand and their work is internationally recognised.

He is pleased with the progress especially with the introduction of the Māori education strategy Ka Hikitia, and the Tātaiako, cultural competencies for teachers of Māori learners.

Implemented well, these documents are powerful agents of positive change for Māori learners. Other programmes too have

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been developed by fellow researchers such as Russel Bishop’s Te Kotahitanga programme. This programme has been successfully implemented in secondary schools but Ministry funding has not been forthcoming to either maintain the programme in those schools nor extend it into the primary school sector.

NZPF has also taken up the cultural challenge with colleagues leading mainstream schools. They want to provide culturally appropriate pedagogies but don’t know how. They want to implement the excellent ideas from Ka Hikitia and Tātaiako but don’t know how.

NZPF’s Māori Achievement Collaboratives have been designed deliberately to provide a supportive environment within which Pākehā principals can confront their own beliefs and values and consider a different world view, a Māori world view. Facilitators are then able to share knowledge of Tikanga Māori and lead them through ways to transform the culture of their school, taking account of its context.

The collaboratives are a major success and are transforming schools into truly bicultural entities all over the country. They are the means by which so many more Māori learners will feel that being Māori has value. Feeling valued is a critical prerequisite to forming meaningful relationships and in the case of Māori children, establishing that all important trust relationship with teachers and peers. These relationships are critical to Māori children feeling a sense of belonging to their school and thus being able to experience success in learning.

Similarly, Pacific Island children in New Zealand struggle and are often located at the lower end of the socio-economic spectrum. But progress is being made. The Stoke School story in this issue (p. 26) demonstrates the importance first of connecting with the Pacific Island community, reaching out and listening and then acting on suggestions. It’s also about allowing initiatives to be led by the Pacific Island community so they feel empowered. It’s again about seeing the world through different lenses, understanding different world views and embracing them.

Once that’s established working relationships can be formed and developed, as described in the story.

Stoke School is one example of many schools in New Zealand that have reached deep into their communities and drawn the community in. Stoke already had a strong sense of biculturalism so reaching out to its Pacific Island community was a natural response to the growing Pacific Island population of the region.

MacFarlane is confident that we can feel optimistic about the future of Māori and Pacific Island education in New Zealand and as the education results improve so also will future work prospects improve. I agree with him. All we need now is the political will to support the excellent work already well underway.

President’s Pen Denise Torrey

National President, New Zealand Principals’ Federation

NZPF’s conference 2015 presented a line-up of key note public support then in comes the political solution. The ‘crisis’ is speakers of stellar proportions. They engaged us; they challenged framed as teachers not doing their job properly, teacher unions us; and they startled us! protecting them, not being accountable and not having proper Professor Meg Maguire demonstrated the harsh reality of standards. Then in come the standards in literacy and numeracy global education reforms which, in a nutshell, can be summed up and suddenly we have a standardised measure of a school’s as the decimation of the public education system in the UK. ‘In ‘performance’. All you do now is set the target to be met. Of course England we haven’t got a [public] schools with a higher proportion system left,’ she said. of challenged learners won’t hit one in five children are failing Earlier this year I visited the target, so they are closed as the UK to attend the National and . . . students are leaving under-performers and turned Association of Head Teachers into private charter schools. As (NAHT) C onference. The school and can’t read, write the number of charter schools atmosphere was damp with or do maths. grows, so the number of charter g l o om a s s c h o o l l e a d e r s schools grows more! Eventually expressed their frustration and despair at how the oppression of public schooling exists only for those students that charter reforms was dragging them and their schools down. Assessment schools refuse to enrol. and so called ‘performance’ are the all-consuming focus and as Maguire said, ‘ . . . children face more of the same, year after year: assessment preparation, then assessment, then repeat’.

School leadership is a statistical exercise in crunching data and preparing children for the next test. Both teachers and children are constantly stressed about passing tests so that their school is not labelled an ‘under-performer’ and closed down by the Office for standards in education (Ofsted) and replaced by a private Total Teaching PD Opportunities Academy (charter) school. in July/August 2016 If that all sounded too horrifying to be real, we then had Professor Alma Harris, also from the UK, repeating the same Neil MacKay, acclaimed international presenter and educator, messages, followed by Professor Diane Ravitch from the USA. returns to New Zealand in 2016 to offer whole school/cluster Ravitch approached the reform agenda even more savagely, based professional development around his concept of Total refusing to dignify it with the word ‘reform’ and instead called it Teaching. as it is ‘ . . . it’s about eliminating public education!’ If you missed This PD equips teachers with just enough RTLB/RTLit skills to “notice and adjust” for students without labels but with clear the conference then read her book Reign of Error, the hoax of learning needs in areas like Dyslexia, ADHD and High Functioning the privatisation movement and the danger to America’s public Autism. school’, or follow her blog.

Comments from his 2015 Workshop Tour Ravitch is an educational historian, appointed to public office A Principal writes, “Already I have had several of my staff comment

by President George W Bush and once supported the ‘No child how positive, refreshing and inspiring the day was and that they left behind’ and charter schools policies. She later thoroughly have already implemented teaching strategies in their lessons researched both charter schools and the No child left behind this week related to what Neil shared.” policy and concluded they would not bring about improvement An RTLB writes, “The teachers were buzzing afterwards and back at school and I hear lots of talk of change and follow up which is in American education. She is a woman who has seen all sides what we want – a paradigm shift and change at the chalk face.” of this political agenda and is now committed to exposing its globally destructive forces.

Individual schools and clusters are invited to make contact She outlined the steps that politicians take in order to power Neil at info@actiondyslexia.co.uk to discuss bookings this agenda. First they manufacture the ‘crisis’, as we have all for 2016. Final date for bookings will be end of November heard in New Zealand with ‘one in five children are failing’ 2016. Neil is also happy to discuss events for parents and and ‘ . . . students are leaving school and can’t read, write or do conferences. maths.’ Even though it is not based in truth, once the ‘crisis’ gets More details at www.actiondyslexia.co.uk

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Charter schools stand to make profits, as we have already seen As the TPPA group continues its debates and negotiations, in New Zealand. They are businesses. So it is not surprising Ravitch has a suggestion to help combat the march of education that global chains of charter schools will be interested in privatisation in New Zealand. She talked of ‘The Opt-Out getting access to New Zealand to set up more charter schools Movement’ which has gained traction particularly in New here. One avenue that could create that opening is the Trans York. The movement is driven by parents who will not allow Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), between New Zealand, their children to be tested. It has grown from 60,000 last year to Australia, Brunei, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Peru, Singapore, United 200,000 this year and is beginning to have influence. Further, States, Vietnam, Mexico and Canada. Many have criticised she recommends using social media like twitter and facebook the TPPA because it favours multi-national corporations to build momentum around opposing the destruction of public and is undemocratic. It allows education in New Zealand. foreign corporations to override Charter schools stand to For such action to be successful the decisions of democratically requires the support of your elected Governments. So even make profits, as we have already parent communities. Many of if our current Government, or you have been requesting the indeed any future Government seen in New Zealand. They are presentations from conference did have a change of heart about businesses. to share with your Boards of the efficacy of charter schools they Trustees and with your parents. could not under TPPA rules stop foreign owned charter school All of the conference presentations have now been posted chains being established in New Zealand. If you think that won’t on our NZPF website and our NZ Principal magazine editor happen you may want to do some further research! has posted a full report covering all of the conference speakers In my opening speech to conference 2015, I asked, ‘what is on the home page of the website. Use these resources liberally. the purpose of education today?’ Reflecting on that speech Share them with as many of your parents as possible. That way, now, I might have suggested that one purpose for education, and only that way will we have any chance of saving our public alongside creating democratically active citizens, could be to school system and our children’s future. train professional educators in education policy making so that they can work with the politicians as co-constructors of policy and not just be the inheritors of it.

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Is it too late to professionalise the Education Council?

Prof John O’Neill Massey University

The National-led government has seriously misstepped to strengthen capability and quality. Logically, the capability and in creating the Education Council. One can only hope this does quality of registered teachers are substantively different from not prove to be a tragedy for both learners and teachers. the capability and quality of other education workers. The term To be clear, I have always been strongly in favour of an “education profession” is therefore a category error. It collapses independent professional body for teachers and still am. This multiple dissimilar occupational groups including those who are means, however, that it must be a body for teachers, it must focus not intended to be subject to the provisions of legislation (e.g., on professionalism and it must act independently. The present teacher aides, instructors, coaches, tutors, teaching assistants, body is in serious danger of educational psychologists and doing none of these three things. Focusing on conduct alone education support workers).

A professional body for Establishment of the Council teachers must be focused solely is based on the view that teachers provided a unique and timely on the teaching profession. opportunity to distinguish Calling the professional body cannot be trusted to make registered teachers from all for teachers an education council professional and moral other education workgroups and is an oxymoron. It undermines professions and it was remiss or teaching. It deprofessionalises judgments about the best mischievous of the government the work of teaching. It is a slap not to do so for ideological, on the cheek for teachers. In fact interests of learners. political and fiscal reasons. it is a slap on both cheeks because Based on the precedent of, teachers themselves will pay handsomely for the privilege of say, the Medical Council, professional bodies are generally having their own professional body undermine their status. concerned with: (i) competence; (ii) conduct; and (iii) ethics. I The name of the new body should have been the “Teaching would wholeheartedly support this scope of oversight activity Council of Aotearoa New Zealand”. Designating a restricted with respect to the teaching profession by a Teaching Council scope of practice (i.e., “registered teacher”) for the new of Aotearoa New Zealand. Professionalism incorporates all independent statutory body is the only way to: (i) gain the active three areas: competent classroom practice informed by a body support and commitment of the teaching profession; and (ii) of professional knowledge and skills; appropriate professional provide assurance to the public and learners that the body will behaviour and relations; and moral judgments that place learners improve the quality of teaching and its statutory oversight. at the heart of everything teachers do. However, in my view the Use of the term education council conflates two quite different government has cackhandedly botched the professionalism occupational categories: “teaching profession” and “education dimension of the Council’s work from the outset by insisting profession”. These are not one and the same yet the body is named that a code of conduct should replace a code of ethics rather to imply that they are, and therefore that they should be overseen than sit alongside it. by the one professional body. This conflation is ideologically The overriding purpose of a professional body is to protect the and politically motivated and not in the interests of the public public interest in so far as it concerns the provision of services to or learners. It seeks to break the power of the existing teacher learners by registered teachers. In this regard, it is the interests of professional associations, NZEI and PPTA, and to dismantle learners that would be central to decisions about the competence, collective solidarity in favour of individual performativity. conduct and ethics of teachers. This is fundamentally important Yet central to securing improvements in the quality and to the credibility and effectiveness of the proposed Council. professionalism of teaching is a clear articulation of the difference Ditching the teachers’ code of ethics is more than a low-trust between the “teaching profession” and any other “education approach to professionalism, it is a no trust approach. Focusing profession” by delimiting the scope of practice and the eligibility on conduct alone is based on the view that teachers cannot be to practise. trusted to make professional and moral judgments about the The term “registered teacher” should be protected in law so that best interests of learners. It is also based on a mistaken view that only teachers registered by the Teaching Council of Aotearoa New when teachers speak out against education policy that they are Zealand would be permitted to describe themselves as such. This somehow putting their own interests ahead of those of learners seems entirely consistent with the primary purpose of the body, and being disloyal to their employers. On the contrary, my

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experience is that teachers do this reluctantly and only when the this role. In this regard, while the Education Review Office is interests of learners are seriously threatened by flawed education often claimed by government to be “independent”, but to my policy. This is a matter of ethics, not conduct. knowledge it has never made critically informed comment on My enthusiasm for the establishment of an independent government policy in its national evaluation reports or public statutory body for teachers is based on the understanding statements. that such bodies are independent of both government and the This underlines the importance of such a requirement for the profession. Registered teachers would pay annual fees to the Education Council. Yet, the new Council risks accusations of independent statutory body. The body would be accountable political interference from the outset because its governance to registered teachers for the use of such fees. structure requires that all members are directly In all other matters, the interests of learners Fixing up appointed by the Minister, and the result of the first and the public would guide the strategic and round of Council appointments does not inspire operational decisions of the Council. In my the Council is confidence. In my view, the model of composition view, this would considerably strengthen the of the Medical Council would provide for a more teaching profession over time and also promote technically balanced, mixed representation of constituencies: greater public confidence in it. It would be a simple but (i) four teachers elected by the profession; (ii) four progressive agenda. Equally, the body’s work teachers appointed by the Minister of Education; and would complement rather than conflict with or politically (iii) four laypersons (not registered teachers). duplicate the essential professional and industrial These are early days for the Council. No doubt it activities already undertaken by the teacher and complex. will long outlast the current government and those principal professional associations in Aotearoa members of Cabinet who are ideologically opposed New Zealand. to teacher autonomy and who have little direct experience of or In order to serve the public interest and those of learners, interest in state education. Fixing up the Council is technically in their leadership role independent statutory bodies are simple but politically complex. A useful start would be for the permitted and expected to make critically informed comment current government to treat the teaching profession with the on government policy in so far as it concerns the teaching respect it deserves and to allow the Council the independence it profession, the public interest and the interests of learners. It is needs to be a genuinely professional independent statutory body. difficult to see how the proposed Council could meaningfully be called an “independent” body were it not enabled to undertake

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CONFERENCE REPORT 2015 Liz Hawes Editor Photolife Conference Photographer

RESIST! RESIST! RESIST! That was the clarion call from lead principals in the room for the wonderful work they do for the keynote presenters Professors Alma Harris and Meg Maguire children in our schools. He said how incredibly proud he is of from the United Kingdom and Professor Diane Ravitch from the quality of teaching and leading in our schools and said that the United States of America, as they addressed NZPF’s 2015 is why the vast majority of children do so well. conference on global education reforms. They described the He acknowledged too that some of our children do not have reforms as having crushed the quality public education systems ideal home lives where it is normal to be read a story at night and of both their countries, leaving barely mediocre private academy be told they are loved by caring parents. He acknowledged that and charter schools in their wake. The three academic heavy- some children are neglected and others are not being adequately weights fired up principals who were attentively glued to their nurtured or nourished in their own homes. seats right through the final day of conference. No one wanted Whilst he did not suggest that schools should be solving all of these sessions to end. these social problems he did say that for some of these children, The programme for the conference was built around the theme school offered them hope which they wouldn’t get elsewhere. of ‘Seeing Education through different lenses’ and recognising the He noted that the government recently increased beneficiaries’ famous axiom of Ann Oakley and Keith Burke that ‘every way of income by $25 a week but was quick to also say that he did not seeing is also a way of not seeing’. In other words, always examine expect this to solve everything. the dominant discourses carefully lest they are obscuring our Key acknowledged the improvements in achievement results view and limiting our thinking. Presentations fell into three in recent times, adding that NZ is not alone in having a tail of categories, the lens of today, the wider lens, underachievement and that ‘nearly every and the lens of tomorrow. It was a cleverly country would have that’. constructed way to examine what we already He said he would welcome ideas about do well in New Zealand and to show case how the government could support some of our own leading educational experts professional development for leaders and and researchers; to scrutinise the wider said that IES was a good way to keep good education policy implications both here and teachers in teaching and reward them internationally; and to explore education rather than just offer them management issues that we will be facing in the future. units.

Memorable conferences like this occur Celebrating through the lens of rarely. They require a sharp, intelligent today visionary with educational wisdom, and a skilled, dedicated organising team. The NZPF President, Denise Torrey Wellington conference got both. Liz Millar, NZPF President, Denise Torrey, gave the principal of Ngaio School was convenor and opening address on the first day of the the Wellington Regional Primary Principals’ conference programme explaining that Association provided the necessary team there have been many system initiatives of expertise. The conference committee in recent years, which don’t easily ‘fit into was well supported by the events company an overarching national direction’. She ‘Conference Works’. Warm congratulations said that there appeared to be an absence to them all. Everything about this conference of a shared vision for education in New from opening to closure engrossed the NZPF President Denise Torrey addresses the conference asking Zealand. delegates. It was a programme that linked ‘What is the purpose of education?’

Consequently, she turned her attention to together seamlessly through the charm and finding out how the initiatives fitted with gentle wit of MC Jehan Casinader.

More than 400 delegates filled the Renouf Foyer of Wellington’s ‘the fundamental purpose of education’. That search left her with Michael Fowler Centre for the opening powhiri. With the official more questions than answers. She opened a debate on the topic procedures over, the Prime Minister, Mr John Key, addressed beginning with a period of time during which the purpose of education was crystal clear. That was in the late 1800s at the time the gathering.

He opened by graciously and generously congratulating all the of the industrial revolution when the purpose for mass education

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Jehan Casinader, MC with his intelligent wit and story-telling, linked the conference presenters together

The Prime Minister John Key opens the Conference

NZPF Kaumatua replies with his whaikorero at the conference opening powhiri

was to ‘teach the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic and curriculum, teaching global awareness, financial, business and socialise children into the ways of [industrial] work and social entrepreneurial skills literacy, civic and health literacy and conformity.’ environmental literacy.

With the industrial revolution long over, what, asked Torrey, She concluded that ‘until we reach an agreed sense of the is the purpose of education today? To answer this question purpose for education in New Zealand today we will continue she suggested that at one level the purpose might still be to to be overwhelmed and bewildered by myriad policy initiatives impart skills, knowledge and values and include socialisation. none of which emanate from a common purpose’.

But it might also include empowerment of children to manage their own learning in a rapidly changing world where we are Professor Angus MacFarlane An esteemed academic from Canterbury becoming increasingly dependent on University, and descendent of the Ngā creativity, problem solving and critical Pūmanawa e Waru o Te Arawa tribe in thinking. That, she said, would imply a the Rotorua district, Professor Angus personalised curriculum and teaching style, MacFarlane is a well-respected leader in a far cry from the standardised instructional Māori education in New Zealand. In keeping and rote learning styles of the late 1800s. with the conference theme, he entitled his So where, she asked, would policies like presentation ‘Footsteps from the past to national standards in reading, writing and inform the present’. maths and the Progress and Consistency Tool For Māori, he said, our future is in our fit into today’s personalised curriculum? ancestry and we can’t just start today and plan Well, not at all, said Torrey, because they for the future without reference to the past. are designed to reduce personalisation and He took his audience back to 1873 and his subjectivity as much as possible. own ancestors, giving us a brief history of the She then turned her attention to modern birth and career of Makereti Papakura who, day employers, presenting the findings as a Māori woman, he told us, was raised by of a recent ‘Economist’ survey on skills her elders and learned her genealogy, history, required for the work place. The survey te reo and tikanga, became a performer, a ranked problem solving, team work, leader and a guide at Whakarewarewa before communication, critical thinking and taking herself off to Oxford in England where creativity as the top five skills for job hunters she later became a scholar and married. ‘She today. Employers would also be favouring Professor Angus MacFarlane for was at ease in two worlds,’ he said, ‘but always a broad curriculum and personalised Māori, the future is found in the past ratified her thoughts from te ao Māori.’ This approach to learning, said Torrey.

Finally she turned to the educational experts including Sir story would resonate in what MacFarlane had to say about his Ken Robinson for their views on the purpose of education own work and aspirations for Māori in a bicultural world.

He took us on a brief stroll through the history of Māori today. Again she met similar arguments with Robinson espousing the personal, cultural, social and economic purposes and Māori education in New Zealand up to the twenty-first of education. He too recommended a personalised curriculum, century. He talked of factors that negatively affected Māori the teaching of tolerance and cultural respect through music children including loss of land, an alien education system, and the arts, cultivating active citizenship and through a broad disease, different styles of housing and clothing, pressure from

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It’s about being aware of the nuances of dominant discourses and being prepared to change them and identifying potential in Māori students so they can be transformed into high achievers.

The successful classroom, according to MacFarlane’s own research, would be built around the concepts of whanaungatanga (relationships) rangatiratanga (teacher effectiveness), kotahitanga (bonding), manaakitanga (caring) and pumanawatanga (morale, tone and pulse). In this way the teacher recognises that there are ‘ethnically linked ways of thinking, feeling and acting’, says MacFarlane, and that sets the scene for challenging assumptions, seeking data, enjoying experiences and respecting others feelings. These are the strengths that emanate from the culturally responsive classroom.

MacFarlane believes that we are on the brink The audience gives Professor Meg Maguire their full attention of creating a new history for Māori in education, premised on some basic imperatives of building on identifying as Māori, and as he put it ‘ . . . a culturally deprived existing approaches to incorporate an ‘educultural’ presence, introducing culturally responsive teaching at the initial teacher education system’.

Using the language of Professor Jamie Bellich, he described training level, growing a sociocultural consciousness, using Ka early education for Māori, from 1867 and the Native Schools Act Hikitia, shifting attitudes, using good teachers and harnessing wise leadership. He concluded his presentation by challenging as an attempt to ‘change Māori into brown Britons’.

Today, he said, we have optimism with initiatives such as the principals to join those ground breaking researchers and school-wide PB4L, Te Whariki, Te Kotahitanga, Te Kauhua and professionals in their quest to challenge the status quo and adopt new ways of thinking so that all schools can Ka Hikitia. These initiatives open doors for become culturally receptive.

Māori and this replenishes them, he said.

Ma c Fa r l a n e t h e n o u t l i n e d h ow Cathy Wylie Eurocentricity in both research and in The second conference speaker was another teaching practice can be damaging because home-grown researcher, Cathy Wylie from it excludes other ways of thinking or the New Zealand Council for Educational theorising and this can legitimise worldResearch (NZCER). Cathy’s most recent wide inequality. publication is the book Vital Connections, ‘We can have the professional practice of which prompted an educational debate on teaching enriched if we take note of Māori what has been lost some twenty-five years knowledge and ethnic epistemology’, he said. after the introduction of the ‘Tomorrow’s He then excited his audience about a Schools’ policy. Her argument led the new movement interested in culturally reader to conclude that connections and relevant pedagogies that has emerged in collaborations that once built strength recent times, led by thinkers such as Paulo and support for school leaders, was now Freire and Henry Giroux. New Zealand a chance happening rather than anything too has its contributors to this movement systematic and that school leaders were in with thinkers and theorists such as Mason need of a reliable system to facilitate greater Durie, Ted Glynn, Russell Bishop, Rose collaboration and structures to support Pere, Jill Bevan-Brown and more. The work their well-being. She used a line from of these thinkers is beginning to impact, as Dr Cathy Wylie gets excited about selfthe famous Henry Wadsworth Longfellow teacher deficit theorising, denial of cultural managing schools poem as a metaphor for Tomorrow’s Schools difference, and low teacher expectations for saying, ‘When she was good she was very Māori are becoming past thinking. This new wave of Māori researchers is ‘ . . . restoring hope and aspiration very good and when she was bad she was horrid’.

In the spirit of MacFarlane, Wylie took an optimistic view of for Māori,’ said MacFarlane. He described the shift as ‘ . . . from the future for education saying that New Zealand schools have deficit to constructivism.’

For MacFarlane change is all about changing the contexts the conditions to bring out the best in school self-management within which Māori children can learn and achieve. He rates and without doubt the NZ Curriculum is the jewel in its crown. the Māori Education strategy Ka Hikitia as an important Current challenges, she said, included isolation, ability to recruit document to guide culturally responsive schools and emphasised the right person for a particular school, unrealistic workloads, the importance of the classroom climate, especially for at-risk variable Board of Trustees capability and ‘expecting schools to solve systemic issues.’ learners.

Despite indisputable gains in student engagement and general It’s about connecting with culture and the students’ experiences, he said, and having high academic and behavioural standards. educational success, one promise of Tomorrow’s Schools was to be

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responsive to meet the needs of Māori education.

Some twenty-five years later the Government says that the system has failed Māori and Pacific Island students and gaps related to social inequalities of the 1990s have greatly increased.

With self-management we lose a connected system, said Wylie, ‘we have lost system coherence.’

Wylie believes that a coherent system begins with a clear purpose for education which includes values and goals from which we can develop frameworks, relationships and roles. The focus at all times must be the whole learner taking account of their context, the NZC and leadership development, all examined from an ‘Inquiry’ lens. This would include reflection and analysis of progress across the whole curriculum.

Between 2007 and 2010 there were considerable gains in teacher collaboration, e-learning opportunities, student achievement, teacher morale and job satisfaction but from 2010 to 2013 Dr Chris Jansen demonstrated the Hon Steve Maharey gave a dynamic it all came to a halt. In particular stress levels had fluidity of networking and futuristic view of the third way for increased with 37 per cent of principals reporting education in New Zealand stress as a factor in 2010 and 48 per cent in 2013.

Wylie proposes a number of reasons for the stalled progress partnership, all ideas which we consider worthy goals and including national standards, cuts to PLD, loss of dialogue, twisted them into a curly question. Are these really goals or just the means to an end? Daringly he then took his audience into heightened competition, higher sense of ‘reputation and ‘risk’.

Some improvements have occurred since 2013 with more the world of possibilities where ‘the end’ is not predetermined principals turning to connect with colleagues in networks or but co-created.

He led us through a series of questions about why we might groups, sharing common issues, attending conferences and providing mutual support. Some are also learning from each collaborate and speculated on ‘what if ’ scenarios. For instance other through mentoring, structured school visits and inquiry ‘what if we collaborated with others to increase our impact and influence or to collectively address a wider threat or projects.

Obstacles however remain with almost 60 per cent of opportunity?’ Appealing notions indeed!

In education he suggested possible drivers for collaboration primary schools in direct competition and 41 per cent taking one fifth or more of their students from outside of their school would come under three sources. These would be for learning zone. Principals are also looking for career pathways beyond attributes, including innovation and problem solving, selfmanagement of learning and knowledge creation; the impact principalship.

Wylie proposes that there are ways forward which include of technology, including connectedness, global reach and using time more flexibly, using inquiry to improve practice, empowerment of learners; and shifts in our educational ‘business valuing openness within school and working across schools to as usual’ such as modern learning environments, co-teaching and student self-management. share challenges, learn from each other and share resources.

He then demonstrated how working together on these can lead She finally looks to schools’ relationships with the Ministry encouraging a resetting of the role and relationships. Just as to both opportunities, especially teacher peer development as Wylie favours greater connectedness amongst principals, she well as risks, such as parents questioning the need for change.

The next phase of his presentation addressed how we should also promotes greater connectedness with the Ministry through developing a connected learning infrastructure together, based organise ourselves and create a design for collaboration.

He showed us a hierarchical structure and a network structure on openness and inquiry and finally she concludes that there needs to be joint work with the sector on policy and system and asked his audience what was the one thing that a hierarchy cannot do? The answer should not have surprised. It cannot do learning development. collaboration or partnership. Only networks, messy and loose Dr Chris Jansen as they might sometimes be, can be innovative, responsive A senior lecturer in educational leadership from Canterbury and collective. His original slide now began to make sense.

University, Dr Chris Jansen reflected on how innovation can Collaboration and networks, he explained are movements. They create educational opportunities. are living systems. A brief description of how the ‘Student Army’ Jansen’s opening slide, resembling a ‘dyspraxic spider’s web’, organised itself in the aftermath of the Christchurch earthquakes might well have driven a few to covertly attend to their email perfectly illustrated the way in which collaborating around a traffic, but they were soon drawn back and were richly rewarded common goal can ‘take on a life of its own’ and sometimes result with his reminder of Alvin Toffler’s famous statement ‘The in unexpected outcomes, such as, in this case, also attracting illiterate of the twenty-first century will not be those who cannot other groups such as ‘Grey Power’ to be involved. read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.’

In the end, he said, it is co-creation and co-design that enable He took notions like co-construction, collaboration and innovation and ownership, rather than starting with a solution. continued pg 16 N Z Principal | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 15

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The Hon Steve Maharey By now the audience was beginning to feel some common themes emerging across speakers and the Vice Chancellor of Massey University did not deviate from the trend. His notion of the way ahead for future education, like the speakers before him, pointed to construction of learning over instruction and placed personalised learning at the centre.

The world today is one of great complexity and disorder, he told his audience. Classrooms are increasingly filled with a diverse range of cultures, abilities and children with learning challenges.

It is no longer a time for teaching content through instruction, which naturally assumes an ordered world, he said.

Maharey outlined a ‘second way’ for children to le ar n through creating and applying knowledge and through con­ struction and com­ petencies. This approach, he said assumes a complex and disordered world He acknowledged that to thrive in today’s world, the skills children require are Dr Peter Cammock recites a poem for not the same as those his appreciative audience required for a more ordered world. Like his predecessors, he listed critical thinking, self-management of learning, adaptability, risk taking, collaborating, creativity and life-long learning as the critical skills for succeeding in life today.

He told his attentive audience that the NZC was a document to be proud of and that he was honoured to have had oversight of its development during his term as Minister of Education. He was quick to note however, that to implement it effectively required successful teaching and school organisation, community engagement, strong leadership and good support. He also listed assessment as an important process emphasising the formative over summative.

Maharey then proposed a ‘third way’ for learning which takes a further step towards student self-management and empowerment. Still based in the personalised learning frame, students would become active participants in constructing their own learning by making their own decisions about why, how and what they learn.

He concluded by saying that in a rapidly changing world only the flexible, creative and innovative will succeed. Education therefore must respond and must do so rapidly.

Dr Peter Cammock Dr Peter Cammock is the managing Director of Leadership Consulting Ltd and Director of the Leadership Lab. The audience knew they were in for a treat by the title of his presentation, ‘The Dance of Leadership’ and his heightened ‘joie de vivre’.

Cammock did not disappoint, enthusiastically opening his

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presentation with a series of short poems. The poems implied that there are choices in leadership and we can construct events optimistically and futuristically or we can focus on the negatives of the past.

He presented a model of management and leadership showing the difference between a centralised hierarchy and a decentralised network approach. Whilst the hierarchical model is about planning, organising and controlling, resulting in compliance, order and efficiency, the network approach is about envisioning, engaging, motivating and inspiring and results in commitment, positivity and innovation. It was quite clear that he favoured the latter model.

Cammock promoted the idea of ‘choosing happiness’ through conversations involving the mind, emotions, thoughts, relationships and engagement. ‘It is through conversation that we glean meaning, direction and life purpose’ he said.

Another way he suggested we can make our work meaningful is to see our job as a ‘calling’ or vocation which benefits both Professor Michael Fullan talks about the individual and the raising the bar and closing the gap organisation. Seeing your job as a calling, he said, is associated with high individual and organisational performance.

He concluded his presentation as enthusiastically as he began with more poetry extolling the virtues of a purposeful life all of which can be gained by seeing life’s work as a ‘calling’.

Looking through the Wider (Policy) Lens Professor Michael Fullan Professor Michael Fullan from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education is no stranger to New Zealand educators, having been contracted to the New Zealand Government as an advisor to help implement the Investing in Education Success policy. He entitled his presentation Convergence for moving forward. In his view, moving forward was about whole system reform at both the macro and micro levels. The rewards for successful reform he listed as improved pedagogy, improved achievement, raising the bar and closing the gap.

He shared some of his own research, conducted in Toronto, from which he deduced that if you want good results, don’t count on external factors to motivate change and don’t obsess about targets. He suggested focussing on a small number of ambitious goals and capacity building.

Fullan cited some successful examples in both Ontario and California but warned ‘never imitate others’ success, just learn from them.’

The remainder of his presentation was devoted to his work

in New Zealand advising the Minister and Ministry on the IES initiative. He conceded that the policy had been foisted onto the system and got a reaction! In his view Tomorrow’s Schools could not work because it is a market model and nor, he said, can a top down model.

Leadership from the middle is the most powerful way to proceed, according to Fullan, because there is more ownership and coherence. He had some warnings about the process saying ‘If you over-plan at the beginning you make a complex problem more problematic . . . so ‘I like your ‘loosey-goosey’ approach’, he said, in reference to the new element in the IES debate, the Joint Initiative.

He suggested that we should take advantage of leadership from the middle through the ‘communities of schools’ because each part of the middle gets better internally, and you learn from each other laterally, he said. In this way you improve professional capital.

Fullan offered a list of simple essentials for effective collaboration.

1. Developing high trust relationships 2. Focusing on ambitious student learning goals linked to measurable outcomes 3. Continuously improving instructional practice through cycles of collaborative inquiry 4. Using deliberate leadership and skilled facilitation within flat power structures 5. Frequently interacting and learning inwards 6. Connecting outwards to learn from others 7. Forming new partnerships among students, teachers and families 8. Securing adequate resources to sustain the work

These resonated with the majority of Fullan’s audience who already engage in clusters and collaborative groups for a variety of reasons and already recognise the factors that make them successful.

He also looked to school cultures saying that ‘talented schools improve weak teachers and talented teachers leave weak schools, adding that ‘the sustainability of an organisation is a function of the quality of its lateral relationships’.

Finally he talked about ‘fault lines’ in the IES implementation, which he listed as the superficial leadership??, the achievement challenge, the use of data, how deep the work [inquiry] might be, support for improvement, the lack of ‘systemness’ identity, the Ministry’s capacity and the potential to get it wrong.

He concluded with a video clip demonstrating that technology cannot do everything and we will always need human conversations.

Professor Meg Maguire Professor Meg Maguire, Professor of Sociology of Education at Kings College, London, had set intriguing expectations with the title of her presentation ‘At the Centre of the Storm’. What storm and what relevance would this storm have to principals in New Zealand?

Maguire swung into action and within the first few minutes, had flashed a UK news item up on the big screen. It drew loud painful howls of recognition from the 550 strong audience. The headline read ‘20 per cent of London pupils leave primary school unable to read or count’. ‘Where have we heard that before?’ ‘One in five are failing!’ howled the audience again, echoing Minister

Parata’s ‘crisis’ call about the state of education in New Zealand.

The item perfectly mirrored all the concerns that New Zealand principals have expressed since the introduction of national standards, public achievement information and league tables; fears that these will lead to obsessions with assessment data, threats of school closure for ‘under-performance’ and chains of charter schools marching in to decimate the public school system. It was a nightmare vision through the lens of the future.

Is this really how we could end up?

Maguire was relentless. Her next slide showed the former Education Minister sitting at a desk with an open book, next to a small child banging her head on the desk beside him. The caption read ‘Some children may face official assessments in all of the first four years of primar y school. The year one screening check can be resat in year two.

Now ministers are to trial a second re-sit of the phonics test in year three for those who have already failed it twice . . . One particular group of children face Professor Meg Maguire gets started more of the same, year on her message after year: assessment preparation, then assessment, then repeat’ A number of statements followed including one from the 2010 White Paper’s forward by Prime Minister David Cameron which reads: ‘What really matters is how we’re doing compared with our international competitors. That is what will define our economic growth and our country’s future. The truth is, at the moment we are standing still while others race past’ (Department of Education, 2010, p. 3) But the one that really got the audience going was from the current UK Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan. It read: ‘We will expect every pupil by the age of 11 to know their times tables off by heart, to perform long division and complex multiplication and to be able to read a novel. They should be able to write a short story with accurate punctuation, spelling and grammar.’

More gems were rolled out from the UK’s Education Secretary including that hit squads could be sent in to take over a school within hours of a critical Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) judgement and fast-track them into academies (charter schools). The same treatment would apply to ‘coasting’ schools if they didn’t urgently improve and raise standards.

‘It has been impossible’, she said, ‘to stop the tsunami of reform throughout 2010–15 and it is set to continue.’ ‘The acceleration of change is amazing. In England, we haven’t got a system left.’

Teachers are the object of policy, not the agents,’ she said. ‘These are not reforms, but deforms,’ she insisted.

Maguire quoted from academic and policy critic, Peter Mortimer who wrote an ‘outspoken study of British Schooling’,

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called ‘Education under siege’. In his book, he drew attention to the incentivisation for competition, she told us, because ‘Ministers believe that only the stiffest competition will bring about school improvement.’ At the same time these Ministers are giving extra funds to academies and free schools (charter schools) irrespective of whether the locals need or want such schools.

Finally Maguire presented some shocking narratives from UK principals and teachers to demonstrate the intolerable stress levels and conditions that educational professionals are currently enduring. She said that it was now becoming almost impossible to recruit teachers or head teachers. ‘We lose 60 per cent of teachers at the five year mark,’ she said.

She concluded in the words of a Bob Dylan song with a warning to the Kiwi audience. ‘Reforms have been inspected, detected and rejected,’ she said. ‘Don’t go down this path.’

In critiquing PISA, she said, ‘if you use competing evidence, you get a different result. PISA takes no account of context and that is the biggest factor contributing to performance.’

She put the challenge, saying ‘if you choose the Global Youth Wellbeing Index as your measure, what country would be top in the rankings then? Australia would be number one and China number fourteen. Everyone would be rushing to Australia! Using one measure for an education system skews the data.

She also said that whilst Shanghai’s success is chiefly attributed to hard working teachers and students, less is said about parents paying vast amounts of money on private tuition so young people can be drilled.

The unfortunate consequence of international league tables like this is that we get unintended consequences. The spotlight goes on teachers who ‘must be underperforming’. It also results in greater standardisation and increased private involvement in education.

‘Standards aren’t wrong,’ said Harris, ‘Standardisation is wrong!’

Professor Alma Harris ‘Children are not appliances so don’t Profe s s or A l m a Har r i s , He a d of treat them as toasters needing standard Educational Leadership at the Institute electrical current!’ of Education London, and currently This is the real problem with PISA she Director of the Institute of Educational said. It’s when the measure becomes the Leadership at the University of Malaysia, target. like her counterpart Meg Maguire, quickly ‘Improving schools is not so impossible, captured her audience. she told her audience, what is more difficult She opened her address on ‘High is sustaining that change.’

Performance’ by emphasising the What really makes a difference is importance of context, which is too leadership, she said, because it is the Professor Alma Harris takes a fresh look often forgotten. She also told us that key to improved school and system at PISA scores not all change is for improvement and performance. She examined different on connections, she said that Fullan had stated you cannot types of leadership from individual charismatic leadership mandate what matters and neither, she said, can you mandate where the one principal does everything, to distributed or collaboration. shared leadership and leadership where the purpose is to Harris made it clear that she believes we should aim for success develop more leaders. for every child in every setting. Some people would argue that’s She distinguished five levels of leadership from the capable not possible, she said, but I would say, ‘So whose child are you individual to the team manager, the competent manager, the going to fail?’ ‘Can you just hear it? she challenged her audience, effective leader and at the top the executive leader. True leaders, ‘Oh, this would be a great school but parents keep sending the she said, don’t create followers, they create more leaders. They wrong children!’ are the leaders who focus on larger goals, are ambitious for the ‘We continue to see attempts to improve schools and systems institution rather than themselves and distribute leadership in ways that are manifestly unlikely to work,’ she said. ‘So much widely. reform, so little change.’

‘It is practising leadership that matters more than who is the Harris drew delight from her audience saying that we need leader,’ she said and that involves relationships and connections. to rethink what high performance means and ‘press the pause She described how leadership involves team work where teams button on the Programme for International Student Assessment are formed for a specific purpose and where teams may have fluid (PISA), which is distorting education. membership according to the task or expertise required. She also Of course the policy makers love measures like PISA, she said, talked of the importance of professional learning communities but there are other issues it does not measure including diversity, for leadership development. inclusion and exclusion, higher education, competing evidence In closing she left the audience with three powerful messages. and context.

First, was to consider the context beyond the data and seek deeper Whilst everyone knows that Finland, Singapore and Chinese explanations; secondly when considering change, focus on the Asian countries do well in PISA rankings, we must remember right things not the latest things and finally, make connections that Finland is a homogeneous country with tight boarder within your school because that’s where the potential for high controls so diversity is not the same issue that it is in New Zealand performance really resides. and the UK. Special education and inclusion is non-existent Her final message was for the education sector of New Zealand in Singapore and where do the Chinese Asians want to go to to unite against the standardisation and privatisation of our university? Not China, but the UK, USA and New Zealand. excellent education system with its world class curriculum continued pg 21 18

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Empowering Future-Focused Leadership The Institute of Professional Learning: Te Whai Toi Tangata (IPL) is a bilingual, bicultural professional development organisation and is an integral part of the Faculty of Education, University of Waikato. We work collaboratively to provide quality professional learning opportunities across and beyond the education sector to grow the capacity of educators to develop their practice.

We believe professional learning should be research based, culturally responsive and benefit all learners.

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Support online practice development Facilitate workshops, seminars, courses of study Undertake longitudinal development projects Support organisational change Coach individuals, teams and organisations Challenge and support innovation and change Research professional learning initiatives Enable personal, professional and career goals Make links to university qualifications Encourage community development Encourage flexible ways of working Integrate technology and online communication platforms

Principal/Leaders Appraisal The purpose of principal (leader) appraisal is to assist in determining whether or not the performance criteria of the Principal’s (or leader’s) position description have been achieved.

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The following criteria are used generally to determine that the satisfactory level is met: • the performance and development goals that are established by the Principal and the Board of Trustees (leader/principal) and, • the Registered Teacher Criteria, and • the Professional Standards as set out for primary or secondary school Principals Other criteria may include: • culturally responsive criteria for teachers of Māori students such as the Leaders behavioural indicators in Tātaiako.

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Leadership Professional Learning Groups (PLGs) The Institute of Professional Learning, Te Whai Toi Tangata offers Leadership Professional Learning Groups as a response to education leaders’ desire to collaborate with colleagues around leadership inquiries, and puzzles of practice. These provide longer term leadership opportunities outside the NAPP (National Aspiring Principals Programme) and FTP (First Time Principals) programmes.

Membership of Leadership PLGs: This can vary. Currently there are PLGs which have • Principals only • Leaders across schools without Principals • Leaders within a school with the Principal • Leaders within a school without the Principal PLG membership is open to all schools and their staff and is available and tailored according to the individual school’s or group’s needs.

Our Values Mahi ngātahi te mahi kia oti, kia tau ai te aroha tētehi ki tētehi, tukua!

Collaborate / Care / Walk the talk Email: professionallearning@waikato.ac.nz www.waikato.ac.nz/professionallearning Ph 07 858 5606 Institute of Professional Learning: Te Whai Toi Tangata, Faculty of Education, University of Waikato, Private Bag 3105, Hamilton 3240, New Zealand

before it collapses as has happened in the UK, the USA and now Australia. Resist! Resist! Resist! she cried.

Professor Diane Ravitch Professor Diane Ravitch, Research Professor at New York University, addressed the audience from Long Island, through a video link. The virtual presentation was no less powerful than had she been physically present.

Ravitch got straight to the point in her opening greeting ‘I have some words of warning,’ she said.

‘You must avoid being infected by GERM (Global Education Reform Movement).

It is not about reform, she said. ‘It’s about pr iv at is at i on and eliminating public education.’

She had stunned the audience into silence.

It’s not that New Zealand principals haven’t heard this message before. They just haven’t heard it so starkly before.

‘It’s about eliminating public education!’ she repeated.

She then explained that the process begins with a narrative about declining standards and schools failing children which leads to a narrative of ‘schools being in crisis.’ Well, none of that’s true, she said.

‘What drags down performance in the United States,’ she said, ‘is poverty, more than any other factor. But politicians and power brokers don’t want to talk about poverty they want to talk about reform.’

‘Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans was a perfect opportunity to turn all the schools into charters,’ she said with more than an ounce of sarcasm. ‘With charters you have no unions, no tenure and no security,’ she added.

There is this loudly expressed view amongst the power brokers that we must be data driven and American test scores are internationally ranked about middle. Therefore schools must be failing. This is not true, Ravitch again insisted. It is all linked to poverty. But there is a further belief that if you standardise testing and the curriculum and everyone has common testing then all children will be successful and all poverty will disappear.

Tests are central to all schooling in America. So much so that we are reaching the point where children no longer read books, just the bits they need for the test, said Ravitch.

The testing culture that is now endemic to the American education system is a multi-billion dollar industry and leading the charge is Pearson. Pearson Education, as it was known until 2011, is a British-owned education publishing and assessment service to schools and corporations and to students. Pearson owns a wide range of educational media brands and reaches across 70 countries internationally with 60 per cent of its sales in North America. It also owns the Financial Times.

What is happening now is that we have education as a ‘for

profit’ industry which we have never seen before. It attracts the entrepreneurs from Wall Street, the Gates Foundation and other large Foundations. They swoop in once they hear that a school needs ‘turning around’. That’s shorthand for school closure and conversion to a charter school. There is a belief that teachers are motivated by incentives such as performance pay and the argument is that you will get higher test scores. Motivational psychology tells us that teachers are not motivated by money but rather by a sense of mastery and of autonomy.

But the waters have become murky as education has become more corporatised.

Corporate reformers c a n’ t i m a g i n e a profession not being driven by profit.

O n e t h i n g t h at doesn’t count in this new environment is experience, which is not incentivised at all. It’s about saving money on teachers so you get many new teachers coming and going. The economists say that experienced teachers do not get higher test scores from their students so you may as well have young inexperienced teachers who cost less. There are teachers in schools who have had five weeks’ training getting great test results. So teaching is become a stepping stone rather than a career and many good teachers are leaving.

What all of this has done is opened the door for computers to become teachers and indeed there are already ‘virtual charter schools’ where students are just given the computer and the materials. Admittedly there is a 50 per cent drop out from these virtual schools but they persist. This is the ultimate in eliminating human relationships from education, Ravitch told us.

It’s a costly business evaluating teachers by test scores but this has been imposed by the Obama administration as part of the economic recovery strategy. The whole education reform programme is a $5 billion investment called Race to the Top. It is not surprising Obama has had to look to the Gates Foundation to help out. Cleverly the Gates Foundation has also poured money into the unions. That way, there is no resistance. Further, Obama relies on the Gates Foundation donations to boost his own election campaign coffers. He wouldn’t get re-elected without their generous support. He also relies on Wall Street for donations to his election campaigns and that is why he must maintain an ‘anti-public-education stance’, supporting standardisation.

By now, Ravitch had transported her audience far from learning children, actual teaching and real school leadership, but when it seemed it could not get worse, she had this to say.

‘There are schools that calculate the ‘value-add’ score and those that simply have literacy and numeracy scores. So if an Art teacher is being evaluated in a school that does not have a ‘value-add’ score they will be judged by the reading scores of the school’s reading teacher! This is called ‘attributed evaluation’ and this really has happened in the State of Florida. It may be

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unfair, but it is not unconstitutional, she assured her disbelieving audience.

To illustrate the environment in which education sits in America, Ravitch explained the example of the Walton family who own Wal-Mart one of the biggest retail outlets in America. They have a very large education foundation and support one in four privately owned schools. Some of those schools have very high test results because the schools are filled with white middle class students and they can exclude those who might muddy their results. Teachers in these schools may be portrayed as miracle workers but in fact they are just using the system. The Waltons also give generous donations to those standing for the local Council in the areas supporting those schools. The subtle message from the reformers is that they are pushing for the future whilst resisters are just trying to protect the status quo. The reformers are of course winning because they have wealth on their side.

Ravitch had delivered the most terrifying of messages, but said there were areas where you can have influence without money.

These she listed as the Bloggers’ network, Twitter, Facebook, and in America, the ‘Opt-Out’ Movement. Opt-Out is a movement started by parents who decided they won’t allow their children to take the test. Last year there were 60,000 such parents, this year there are 200,000. New York, she said, is a hot bed of the ‘Opt-Out’ movement. The dream is that you present the test and nobody takes it. It would be a bit like having a war with no soldiers, she said.

So it is important to get the message out to parents. You need a media campaign, a social network campaign and as leaders of schools you need to talk to parents, she counselled.

And her final words for her Kiwi audience?

Resist! Resist! Resist! she insisted. Public schools are vital to a democracy.

Phil O’Reilly Phil O’Reilly is the Chief Executive of BusinessNZ and he addressed his audience through the business lens of tomorrow.

There were six factors influencing New Zealand’s future, according to O’Reilly.

The first is that we are globally connected, he said. That refers to more than just Australia and China he cautioned. The next place for manufacturing will be Africa, he told his audience.

Secondly, New Zealanders are friends with everyone. We have no enemies and we have never invaded anyone. We are able to be friends with America and China at the same time, which will only become more important in the future.

We are very good at high value industry and niche industries.

Take the Rocket Lab in Canterbury for example, he said. That is a classic example of a high value technology and services business.

We are much more than a farm, even if agriculture does play an important part in our economy. We are also good at high technology engineering and making movies, he said. Although our research and development spend is low, where it has been increased the benefits are obvious. We are a small country and distant from most others, so we are isolated which does create problems for us, he said.

We have high quality institutions, a corruption free bureaucracy and court system, good border control and a high quality education system. Because we are corruption free we are able to have an efficient economy and free and open debate, he said. However we do business with a variety of countries, not just European countries. Some of our trading partners are not

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corruption free and we have to adapt to that.

The implications of these factors are that it’s not all about Asia. Rather think Latin America. They are an emerging power house and we get on very well with them. Think Middle East and Africa as they become more globalised. They too find it easy to connect with us.

Resilience and connections will matter in the future, said O’Reilly and it is good that the NZ Curriculum recognises this.

The future will see us making more frequent on-line and off-line connections, he said.

New Zealand Society will change as we become more multicultural. For example, right now we have refugee families in Mt Roskill. People will have different ideas so we will have to carefully deliberate to know what changes will advantage all of us.

We are fortunate to have good social cohesion in New Zealand and can use that to integrate many cultures to our mutual benefit.

There will however be some challenges to that social cohesion and also to various institutions. The government will not be able to solve all of these problems and so we can expect talk of the private sector being involved as well. There are also implications for the education system. Work ready skills will be critical. There will be many high value, high skill jobs, while low skill jobs will diminish.

Both hard and soft skills matter. We will need hard skilled scientists and technologists but also those with the soft skills of high emotional IQ, customer service and self actualisation.

We already produce people high in these soft skills and New Zealanders abroad are often recognised for them. We are good at connecting and recognising the context of others which is a highly valued skill.

Another set of skills we do need are those of Science & Technology but students are not readily taking up these subjects.

It may be that we need to look to incentives for these areas or at least better understand why students are not choosing these subjects.

There are also some problems. Poverty is holding kids back.

Mostly these kids are in rural and regional locations. There is no doubt that kids in decile one schools come from deprived homes.

There are some excellent examples of schools in New Zealand that have developed models to address problems associated with poverty and other low decile schools could benefit from sharing some of those ideas. O’Reilly suggested it was much more sensible to look to our own good practice than to look overseas for models. ‘It’s what’s good for New Zealand that matters, he said, not what’s good for Switzerland.’

He also suggested that schools need on-going conversations with businesses to co-invest in New Zealand schools if we wish to maintain our high quality education system.

Dame Diane Robertson Dame Diane Robertson is the CEO of the Auckland City Mission, who also has a background in teaching. Her topic question was ‘What stops people moving out of poverty?

Poverty is Robertson’s business and she has mapped and researched the topic in depth. She used genograms, which are a bit like a family tree to better understand the complex relationships within the families of her clients and service maps and debt maps to better understand how these clients were being supported, or not. This allowed her to map, for example, a food journey. It can be a very long journey to get food from a food bank, including bus trips, visits to WINZ for the letter verifying that the client does

not have money for food, then further bus trips to get to the food bank, then to the budgeting agent before a food parcel is allocated, she said. Some who have never had this experience are very quick to say that it’s the family that has to change.

Every principal in the audience was aware of factors that prevent children learning. They often include lack of food and of course hungry children can’t concentrate. But it’s not just lack of food – some mothers won’t send their children to school because they are ashamed not to have a school lunch to give them. Broken school attendance is also detrimental to learning.

To think that ‘food-in-school’ will resolve the issues is simplistic thinking. These families also have housing issues and frequently move from school to school as they move house or lodgings, said Robertson. They are also isolated, often have no friends, don’t go to birthday parties, haven’t got fees for trips or excursions and are in poor health, she said. And the mothers who are trying to manage life better by not eating themselves suffer reduced cognitive functioning. It is not that they are any less intelligent or able to learn it is that they are hungry and often cold. Those two factors can reduce IQ by 13 points.

Women dealing with poverty have no energy left over for their children, said Robertson. It’s not that they don’t try. It is energy sapping seeking food, going from agency to agency and being treated like scum, whilst trying to hide from the debt collector while your cognitive ability is impaired.

‘Parents want their kids to do better. They want education for their kids. They often take training courses that don’t lead to jobs, but do lead to more debt, she said. ‘Education is a way out of poverty, but poverty stops people participating in the first place.’

Robertson did not feel that the answer to this dreadful social ill was the schools’ responsibility. She suggested that the root of the problem lay in inequality.

Whilst she acknowledged that social workers in schools did make a difference, until there are systemic changes, we are doing no more than just patching the problem, she said. ‘People talk about navigators to lead people through a screwed up system.

Why not change the system?’ she said.

Robertson would happily offer some advice for change.

1. Every child in a healthy home 2. Food 3. Debt consolidation – for many low income families 90 per cent of the income is spent on debt and food is a discretionary item 4. There are many NGOs competing for funding and these agencies need to work together 5. Stop imposing more on women in poverty

Dr Jennifer Garvey-Berger Dr Jennifer Garvey-Berger is an expert in leadership who believes a leader’s job is about developing people to be their ‘biggest’ selves, and that requires leaders to be constantly learning.

She talked about ‘Leading the possible and preparing for an unknowable future’ The world is not simple it is complex and often chaotic, said Garvey-Berger. If we try to apply basic ‘cause and effect’ methods to making changes, we are likely to fail unless we are in a completely predictable world. In education that is very unlikely.

She presented a framework called the Cynefin Framework, adapted from Dave Snowden. The framework describes four different worlds from the predictable, where everything is obvious, to the predictable where things are not entirely obvious,

Minister Parata is invited to say a few words to the conference delegates

to the complex unpredictable world and on to the chaotic unpredictable world.

She suggested that there is probably a world which we choose for our school to operate in most of the time. But that may not be the world in which your school should remain. She invited the audience to think about which world their school should be moving towards and why.

Different challenges might evoke different responses, she suggested. For example, if we were to address poverty, we wouldn’t apply the obvious predictable method because we don’t know what the steps might be to resolve it. We also don’t know the context within which it exists. We need the conversation first.

It is more likely that in Garvey-Berger’s view, such an issue would in the end be progressed by nudging the system.

Garvey-Berger encouraged listening as an important leadership skill because it is through listening that common ground is often found. ‘Frequently, she said, we agree on the same goals, but differ on how to find a path to reach them. Good leaders she said, will be prepared to see the other point of view and even adopt it.

That builds strong relationships and empowers others. When preparing for the unknown, Garvey-Berger said, critical thinking and knowledge creation are most important. That requires understanding how others think not just what they know.

In conclusion . . .

The conference programme’s theme of seeing education through different lenses brought a coherence to the different topics which gave it a very pleasing shape and sense of rationality.

Messages that came through strongly and repeatedly stressed that self-selected collaborative activities where all members have a common purpose can be beneficial to leadership development and to learning communities. A further issue echoed repeatedly was the fact that New Zealand’s education system lacks clear purpose and direction.

The conference clarified that here in New Zealand we can be proud to have some excellent examples of sound research, contextualised to our environment and conducted by our own researchers from which all principals can learn and improve their leadership practice.

It is timely that we continue to take on board the strong warning from speakers from both the UK and the USA that global reforms are dangerous and destructive and should be resisted.

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NZPF PAYS TRIBUTE TO RETIRING KAUMATUA Liz Hawes Editor

Whakataka te hau ki te uru Whakataka te hau ki te tonga Kia mākinakina ki uta Kia mātaratara ki tai E hī ake ana te atakura He tio, he huka, he hau hū Tīhei mauri ora Cease the winds from the west Cease the winds from the south Let the breeze blow over the land Let the breeze blow over the ocean Let the red-tipped dawn come with a sharpened air.

A touch of frost, a promise of a glorious day.

and often humorous stories of Tauri’s visits to Wellington on behalf of the executive. He described Tauri as a ‘Māori Education Colossus’. His stories illustrated Tauri’s commitment to his role as kaumatua for the Federation, his graciousness and humility, and his exceptional ability to build bridges between Māori and Pākehā. Above all, Peter told the audience, Tauri knew how to foster relationships and he used those relationships to strengthen the NZPF kaupapa. ‘The food of the chiefs is speech,’ Peter said, ‘but what counts is what Tauri could achieve through his speech and his purposeful humour. His addresses and his karakia were always inspirational,’ he said, ‘and I am a better man for his teachings.’

He recalled recently asking Tauri what it felt like to be 80 years old. Tauri’s quick-fire reply was ‘There’s not a lot of peer pressure’.

Peter thanked Tauri’s family, who had come to celebrate this special occasion, for managing without their Dad whilst he supported, mentored and kept the principals of Aotearoa New Zealand culturally secure.

This karakia was NZPF kaumatua, Tauri Morgan’s signature incantation. He often recited it to invoke spiritual guidance and protection for the NZPF membership. When the Federation opened a hui, a moot, or a national conference, the NZPF President Denise Torrey karakia created the perfect metaphor to bring hearts and minds NZPF President Denise Torrey talked of the mana that Tauri together to focus on a common purpose, to create new directions, brought to NZPF and thanked him for imparting his considerable experience, knowledge and to embrace fresh ideas and to wisdom on the many hundreds reach agreed outcomes for the It was an unforgettable night of tamariki and tumuaki who future benefit of the tamariki of punctuated by moving speeches, have been transformed through Aotearoa. his teaching, mentoring and The driving force behind humorous anecdotes and a coaching. She said the executive everything Tauri did was to felt truly honoured that Tauri had e n h an c e t h e e du c at i on a l surprise visit . . . fulfilled the kaumatua position prospects for tamariki. As the NZPF whānau celebrated Tauri’s considerable contribution to for NZPF for the past fifteen years. ‘Presidents past and present the education sector over many years, we heard this message thank you,’ she said, ‘for walking alongside them, giving them strength, confidence and support to be strong advocates for repeated many times, by many different speakers.

The tribute to Tauri was held at the Rydge’s Hotel in his own their colleagues.’ She also acknowledged the links Tauri created home town of Rotorua. No one could have anticipated that the in partnering NZPF with Te Akatea, The Māori Principals’ celebratory dinner would simultaneously become a stroll through Association, and how that relationship led to members of Te the annals of NZPF history. Life members, including founding Akatea being elected onto the NZPF national executive. ‘The member Ian Payne and former NZPF presidents from as far back executive members from Te Akatea gave us a much richer as 1989, turned out in unimagined numbers to honour the man understanding of Tikanga Māori,’ she said, and that led us to who had given so much to education and to NZPF in particular. partner with Te Akatea and the Ministry to develop the Māori It was an unforgettable night punctuated by moving speeches, Achievement Collaboratives, a unique initiative designed to humorous anecdotes and a surprise visit from a passing Māori build truly bi-cultural school communities. She assured Tauri that his place in the history of NZPF is enshrined and that the concert party who dropped in to honour Tauri. organisation will always honour the generosity of his fifteen Peter Witana years’ commitment to NZPF. Peter Witana, former member of the NZPF national executive, played Master of Ceremonies throughout the night and drew Russel Young on his own close relationship with Tauri to both enlighten and Russel Young, NZPF Treasurer for 16 years, gave a potted history entertain us. Between introducing speakers, he shared insightful of the Federation from the 1990s. ‘When I joined the NZPF 24

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executive, there were only 20 member schools, mostly from Auckland, and so we went out to the country principals and gave them morning tea, to encourage them to join,’ he laughed.

Today of course some 90 per cent of all primary and intermediate schools are NZPF members alongside one third of all secondary schools. He went on to explain that it was the election of Con Coffey as President (1987–1989) that opened the doors to parliament and the Minister’s office. ‘This was the ‘Tomorrow’s Schools’ era, a time when principals would be needing strong and effective advocacy,’ he said.

He also recalled Tauri’s inauguration as kaumatua in the late 1990s and the less formal gatherings of assorted executive members that took place at Whangamata beach, where several had summer batch connections. ‘We would gather on the Friday night,’ he explained, ‘and would head out to a restaurant for dinner.

Tauri would be there and he would sing. The whole restaurant would sing and no one would want to go home!’ he laughed. ‘The restaurant loved us!’ He went on to say that many a fresh idea on how to better support principals was hatched at these informal gatherings which later turned up on the national executive agenda.

Pat Newman Pat Newman, president of the Te Tai Tokerau Principals’ Association and former NZPF president said of Tauri, ‘It has been an honour to have you as our kaumatua and a privilege to become your friend, because friendship never dies.’ Pat was a member of the NZPF executive at the time Tauri was recruited to the role of kaumatua. ‘Tauri was the obvious candidate,’ he said. ‘He had proved himself to be an excellent leader, a knowledgeable and very wise man and a very strong advocate for Māori education.’

He spoke of Tauri’s days as principal of Waiouru School, and how fortunate the Waiouru children and staff were to have such an astute and supportive principal. He talked of Tauri’s ability to make vital connections and reach out beyond his school to the community the children lived in. ‘He has always been about kids first,’ said Pat, ‘and to get the best for kids means understanding their family and their community.’

Colin Watkins Colin Watkins, president of the Rotorua Principals’ Association told the audience that when he thinks of NZPF, the face he sees is always Tauri Morgan. ‘Tauri has opened and closed every NZPF conference I have ever attended over 14 years,’ he said proudly. He said it would be hard for anyone to follow in Tauri’s footsteps, or to harness the respect that Tauri has long attracted. ‘But tonight,’ he said to Tauri, ‘it’s about celebrating and acknowledging your outstanding contribution to education.’

Speeches for the evening concluded with a heart-warming oration from Tauri’s son Rex Morgan and an equally moving song from Tauri’s daughter Denise. Rex, a top Wellington chef, told us that his Dad had always put others before himself and the way he reached out and brought people together was amazing. Despite his educational duties taking him away from the family, Rex assured us that Tauri did make time for his family and was always a great listener. Rex also took the opportunity to acknowledge the part his Mother Wendy had played in supporting Tauri in his work. The pride he held for his Father and his achievements and the warmth of this close knit family was unmistakable.

A presentation to Tauri of a pounamu pendant followed and finally Tauri took the floor himself. As always he was gracious and humble in his response. He told us that he and his family were overwhelmed that NZPF would come in such numbers

to his home town to celebrate his retirement as kaumatua. It made him feel very humbled, he said. He reminisced ov e r h i s y e a r s on t h e e x e c ut i v e a n d as kaumatua telling us what a privilege it had been for him to meet and engage with so many wonderful people. He considered he had been ver y lucky throughout his teaching career to have had so many wonderful opportunities to make a difference and that made him feel very satisfied and proud. Whilst that may indeed be true, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind, that those opportunities were created

by Tauri himself who actively sought ways to improve the lives of those with whom he came into contact, whether inside or outside of his school.

As the curtain fell on a magnificent evening of tribute and celebration, the conversations and reminiscing continued long into the night.

He hono tangata e kore e motu; ka pa he taura waka e motu Unlike a canoe rope, a human bond cannot be severed.

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WE’RE STOKED The Editor takes a trip to Nelson’s Stoke School to see why ‘whānau’ is top of the school’s values list and what that means for the multi-cultural Nelson school . . .

Liz Hawes Editor

Stoke School sits between Richmond and Tahunanui on the fringes of the charming little city of Nelson. It is a decile four school of 230 children with a big heart, a long reach and a loyal community.

‘We are a whānau-first school,’ says principal, Peter Mitchener.

‘Our key driver is building and developing our community,’ he says. ‘We see the school as a hub or centre for the things our community needs, because if we support the family, the child will be better catered for and will get success.’

This idea came from Peter’s own sabbatical studies in which he examined the concept of social agencies in schools. He was aware of the agencies working in Stoke who had connections with the families of his children and he wanted them to be part of the school. Peter’s Board of Trustees was very positive about the idea and together they re-examined the school charter to accommodate this notion. The number one annual plan goal became designing social agency strategies for the child and executing the plans through a community approach. The second

Children hard at work 26

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goal was to acknowledge that teachers, children and adults are all learners as well as teachers, when you empower your community and finally, the school aspires to be fully inclusive of its significant (23 per cent) number of children on the special needs register.

‘A community house, located very close to the school, had just developed a group called the Stoke Stakeholders Group’, said Peter.

This group included the Ministry for Social Development, the marae, health nurses and workers, state housing and Work & Income New Zealand. ‘We put the call out to all social agencies working in our area to meet together. We are now working on goals to integrate these groups as a whole,’ he said.

Peter’s concept of ‘community’ is clearly not confined to the school children and their parents alone. He sees the whole community from pre-schoolers to the elderly as having an influence on the children in his school. What he wants most is to ensure that that influence is positive both for the children of his school and for other community members. To this end he encourages community groups to use the school facilities. ‘It’s

Principal Peter Mitchener

opening doors to communications, to building relationships and nurturing strong communities,’ he says.

The school hall, a jewel in the school’s crown, is made available to a range of different community clubs and groups such as the pilates group, the composting environmental group, quilting and various musical groups such as the Country & Western Music group and the Highland Band.

‘We particularly wanted clubs that benefit and grow our whole community and make strong links with our parents and grandparents,’ said Peter.

Another group looking for a ‘home’ was Te Piki Oranga, a Māori Health group. Stoke School had an unused Dental Clinic on site which is being used as a health clinic for Te Piki Oranga.

‘We have nurses in the clinic changing the dressing on ‘Auntie’s’ leg whilst they are also testing one of our children’s hearing,’ says Peter. ‘But before we know it, we have ‘Auntie’ asking if the school needs a breakfast club helper,’ he said. ‘In some cases we find that ‘Auntie’ has become a surrogate ‘nana’ to children who don’t have a nana of their own.’ In this way, the school is providing opportunities for connecting children with people in the community who they wouldn’t ordinarily meet, which brings mutual benefits and strengthens the community as a whole.

‘Relationships with our community are everything to us,’ he says. ‘Take today, for example. We are celebrating the Matariki [Māori New Year] and the whole school community is invited.

Our children will have their work on display and there will be performances from individual classes, the Kapahaka group, choir, guitar groups and the school band,’ says Peter proudly.

Year 5/6 teacher, Kiri Wahanui has coached the Kapahaka group and expects high standards from all of the children.

Everyone must do their very best to get their actions right and the singing must be strong and clear. Timing is everything and the practice session continues until Kiri is satisfied. Kiri also expects a ‘fierce’ haka performance from the boys. As they repeat the performance the volume rises and the boys’ faces become more ferocious until they can be clearly heard right to the back seats of the hall. Ka pai! Now they are ready for the show tonight.

Meanwhile behind the school, local Māori are preparing a hangi.

We head out to the hangi pit and there we find at least a dozen men and women toiling away. The men are digging the pit and building the fire whilst the women are preparing the food. They have been at the school for some hours and will be on deck to lift the hangi of pre-sold food parcels after the show.

‘The hangi is a fundraising effort for the Te Whai Oranga

Principal Peter Mitchener chats to one of the students in the playground

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The School’s values are unashamedly on display

community house,’ says Peter. ‘Having the hangi here on the teacher and the child, each represented by a different colour, and school grounds, as part of our Matariki celebrations, means the three school rules of respect, responsibility and safety. The that the children can observe the whole process from digging kowhaiwhai is slowly being integrated into school signage and the hole to serving the food. It’s a wonderful cultural learning print materials. It is not a question of ‘out with the old and in experience for them and at the same time is helping Te Whai with the new.’ It’s a blending of the kowhaiwhai into the existing Oranga,’ says Peter. It’s a perfect example of the mutual benefits school’s history and symbolism. ‘We retain the old school logo,’ that come from supporting the community. says Peter, ‘but the kowhaiwhai will be incorporated into it,’ he The school roll is 30 per cent Māori so said, ‘because it better represents who we establishing a bicultural environment has are today.’ always been a priority for principal, Peter Stoke also has a growing Pacific Island Mitchener, who maintains we cannot aspire population, currently making up twelve to be multi-cultural until we are bi-cultural. per cent of the total school roll. Peter was His school’s strategic plan reflects his keen for his Pacific Island families to feel ambitions to make the school environment ownership of the direction for the Pacific more bicultural through carvings, art, Island children in his school. bicultural signage and strengthening the ‘We consulted with our Pacific Island Te Reo and Tikanga Māori plans. families,’ said Peter, ‘and asked them what ‘Our school is the second oldest in New they would like us as a school, to develop Zealand,’ he tells me, ‘so with the richness for their children.’ of history, there are many stories to tell.’

The Samoan families took the lead The story Peter is most proud of just because they are the greater number now is the gradual development of the but other Pacific Island ethnicities school logo towards incorporating the new were not left out. Overwhelmingly, it kowhaiwhai. It is a beautiful design called was communications, ownership and ‘whānau’ to symbolise a positive ‘family’ developing a sense of belonging within community, working together, accepting the school community, that dominated the each other, nurturing and sharing and discussions. Peter welcomed this response was developed in consultation with local which was perfectly consistent with the iwi and the community. It symbolises the school’s existing whānau concept and Leading the Kapahaka group’s action three-way partnership between parent, also fitted comfortably with the Ministry’s song

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Only a ‘fierce’ haka will do

The Kapahaka group practises to produce a polished performance for the Matariki celebrations

Pasifika Education Plan.

A long term plan for Pacific Island language and culture was developed which the parents insisted would be their responsibility. The first stage was to establish a group for language and culture, driven by the parents as their way of supporting the school. The second stage was to establish Pacific Island cultural festivals and to get started they chose to link up with the already established Kapahaka festival. The Kapahaka festival is sharing performances between the six or seven local schools that form a cluster. Now the cluster’s schools are including Pacific Island performance as part of the Kapahaka festival. Stoke is the only school with a Pacific Island group but we welcome Pacific Island kids from other schools to join us. The third stage was to extend beyond the performing arts into stories and language. In the final stage, the children themselves will be acting as tutors in their own classrooms for their classmates and the Mums and Nanas will present Pacific Island knowledge to the whole school.

‘The plan is totally driven by the Pacific Island community,’ says Peter. ‘The school is just the vehicle,’ he says. It is an organic process in which the parents and grandparents participate. They own it,’ he said.

The plan has Peter’s full support and there are teachers behind it too. Importantly though, they come in behind the Pacific Island families who are the leaders. The families are the ones empowered to carry out the plan.

‘Next they would like to fundraise to go to Samoa,’ says Peter.

Whilst this is a big step and may prove to be a step too far, if it’s an idea coming from his Pacific Island families, then Peter will

be doing everything in his power to help them achieve it, just as he did when they wanted a play-centre.

‘One of the issues raised when consulting with our Pacific Island families was the absence of a pre-school facility where mothers, as first teachers, could attend alongside their children.

We had plenty of land,’ he said, ‘so we gifted a section on which the play-centre was built.

The facility has proven hugely popular and is also the site for Pacific Island parents and grandparents to meet and share their knowledge, songs and stories and plan their cultural activities for the school. The play centre is also open to those whose families do not have children at Stoke school.

Further feedback from the Stoke community included a gaping technology hole for one third of the school’s families who had no computer or internet connection in their own homes. With the support of the ‘computers in homes’ programme, Peter was able to offer a computer suite at his school for parents to attend classes offered by tutors from the ‘computers in homes’ programme.

Some classes are held at night time and others during the day.

‘It is so helpful for the children to see their parents attending school classes,’ says Peter. ‘It just sends the message that we all belong here at this school and we are all learning together.’

‘The parents have morning tea with the teachers if they are attending computer classes,’ says Peter, ‘which means that staff are having weekly conversations with the parents. That builds confidence and trust and strong, healthy relationships,’ he said.

Whilst the school lives its philosophy of reaching out, there are also those agencies reaching in to support the school’s efforts.

Preparing the food for the hangi is a full day’s work.

The fire is set, ready for the hangi

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School is fun at year one

The children have a think about how you get to Wellington

‘We are really lucky to have the support of business like ‘PlatinumPlay who donated our senior playground equipment and the Canterbury Community Trust who were so generous in supporting the refurbishment of our school hall and classroom block,’ he said.

‘We also have generous support from other agencies too,’ he says. ‘On Mondays the local church cooks soup and rolls for the children; we have fruit every day; we are in the milk in schools programme; and we have a breakfast club in the mornings.

Bunnings Warehouse has just built our school a series of raised beds for our garden programme and Soon Kidscan will be supporting us to plant orchards on our back field.’

‘A journey like this is not without its bumps and hurdles,’ says Peter, ‘and we quickly learned about the health and safety legislation requirements with having so many members of the community coming and going,’ he joked.

Consistent with the whānau philosophy, Stoke school has an open-door policy so parents can come and go as they wish. ‘This practice can only work when every staff member is on board,’ says Peter.

He confesses that when he first arrived at the school he thought that by being a good role model the tone would be set and staff would follow but soon learned he had to be quite specific about his intentions.

‘The leader shows the direction and shines the light,’ he says, ‘and I needed to stop and explain that this is our philosophy and

these are our goals,’ he said. He was quick to admit that unless the staff are right there with you, there is no chance of achieving your vision, no matter how great it might be. He considered himself lucky to have a wonderful staff who did share his vision and were prepared to bring the community with them.

Peter considers looking after his staff and keeping them together as a team to be a priority and to this end they have shared lunch and can attend a pilates group together every Tuesday afternoon. Most take advantage of these activities which is also an opportunity to relax, get to know each other and enjoy each other outside of the classroom.

It is easy to see how the whānau value operates at Stoke school.

The real test is of course whether this school culture has a positive impact on the children’s learning.

‘We’ve seen a steady improvement in children’s progress,’ says Peter, ‘and that is ultimately what we are all aiming for,’ he said.

What makes him feel most proud is observing the children actively participating in their learning and not just being passive recipients of education. He says it is also satisfying to watch how they genuinely care for one another and enjoy coming to school.

And what do the children think about their school? ‘It’s a cool school because we can learn guitar,’ says one enthusiastic little boy. ‘I like school because we have fun,’ says a year one little girl.

‘It’s a bit like being in a big family and there’s heaps of stuff to do,’ says a thoughtful year six student. If ‘whānau’ is what Stoke School is trying to achieve, it sounds like a success story to me.

Parents, grandparents and other community members packed the school hall to enjoy the Matariki celebrations with the school

Pasifika culture is celebrated at Stoke School

N Z P r i n c i p a l | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 15

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School Lines It's not adding up What counts most: sticking with the “Project”, or confidently numerate children?

Lester Flockton

feedback, feedforward, Feedup, feeddown lester.flockton@otago.ac.nz

Repeatedly the evidence from international surveys (TIMSS, PISA) and national surveys (NEMP, NMSSA) has been showing a pattern of decline or negligible improvement in mathematics performance by our nation’s children. A 2013 OECD report showed that New Zealand's ranking in maths had slipped from 12th to 23rd. between 2001 and 2012 (the Numeracy Project was implemented in 2000). Why is this? Are successive cohorts of our children becoming less and less able to learn than previous cohorts? Are our teachers becoming less and less competent to teach? A common sense answer to these simplistic questions is categorically no!

So if it’s not the kids who are the problem, and it’s not the teachers, then what is it? But wait on. Before attempting to answer this important question we need to ask if we are willing to see the problem through a wide-angle lens, or are we content to settle with a narrow focus lens? Are we prepared to think and work outside of the square, or are we stuck inside it? Are we plain and simply at risk of being in submissive denial – a justificatory mindset resulting from the vast over investment of time, effort and resources in course attendances, staff meetings, Internet searching, downloading, photocopying, manufacturing learning plans and assembling activities, churning out assessment paperwork, deciphering the ever increasing hoopla of jargon, and so on. All of this has become the hugely disproportionate industry and cost of the Numeracy Project at the expense of so many other dimensions of teaching and learning across the curriculum that deserve a better deal. Unfortunately some have poured so much into this Project that they are unwilling to see past it. They don’t want to let it go.

From time to time I have had occasion to meet up with maths gurus, including some who have been at the forefront of the Numeracy Project. I like to ask them why New Zealand's mathematics performance is trending down rather than up as a result of what is proving to be a multi-million dollar extravaganza. Without fail they trot out the same superficial argument: “It’s the teachers!” Yes, various studies do show that mathematics is not the forte of many primary teachers, but then again those same teachers may excel in other areas that are equally important, if not moreso. Of the reportedly $70 million plus already spent on the Numeracy Project, a large chunk was undoubtedly spent on teacher development – not to mention the vast and inestimable expenditure of teacher time. Yet outcomes continue to fail to impress.

In June of this year the New Zealand Herald reported Education Minister Parata as saying that the math challenge in New Zealand would be addressed by “raising the quality of

teaching and ensuring that resources are shared” (whatever that might mean). A couple of years ago she told the Herald that National Standards would address the math problem, yet 5 years into the Standards and improvement has amounted to nothing more than a tiny upward creep, which could easily be negated by considerable measurement fragility. So let’s not take National Standards too seriously.

In the same 5th June Herald article Dr Stoop of the Ministry of Education was reported as saying that there were multiple contributing factors to a decline in mathematics achievement, and attributing this to a single factor didn’t take into account other influences on student achievement. He added “It is possible that the way the Numeracy Project was applied may have varied between schools . . . ” Ah, that cursed variability thing again! Of course there will be variability because of the very

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way the Numeracy Project approach is designed and packaged.

It’s ripe for it. It is one of the key underlying problems that is undermining improvement. I doubt that no matter how many more millions are poured into teacher education programmes, that this will solve the problem. So what could be done?

First, be very clear that the Numeracy Project is not mandatory.

You might have invested a mammoth amount of time and energy on it, but that is no justification for keeping a programme that is not doing it for so many kids and their teachers. Consider alternatives, and if an alternative programme is introduced, strenuously desist from the lolly mix approach of using bits and pieces from this programme and that programme.

Second, have a few essential principles that any alternative maths programme must adhere to before it is adopted. For example, they might include the following: ■■

■■

The programme has a clear, sequential learning structure that gives first priority to children incrementally learning and mastering a consistent and successful method (strategy) for performing number operations, supported by a strong underpinning of place value and facility with basic facts.

The core strategy is taught to increasing complexity through successive stages of their learning. The exploration of alternative (multiple) strategies is reserved as extension learning for those who have comfortably mastered the core method.

To ensure consistency across the school, all teachers base their teaching on a text-based programme that “spirals” learning, ensuring that children have plenty of practice to master each step before progressing to the next level of complexity.

Moreover, what is learned is systematically revisited so that the learning doesn't fade.

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The text-based programme is distinguished from a “textbook” programme, in that it allows teachers to support children’s learning in appropriate ways. It is designed and presented in a manner that it is largely “teacher proof ”, so that those teachers for whom mathematics is not a strength will be effectively supported by a readily comprehensible and illustrative text.

The text-based programme will ensure consistency of content across all levels of the school, and will very significantly reduce the amount of time that many teachers currently spend on working out math programmes, hunting down and assembling resources. The school’s existing stock of mathematics materials will be largely sufficient for use with the text-based programme.

I would argue that the time has come when any further “fix it” attempts with the Numeracy Project should be discontinued, otherwise the problems will linger on – at the expense of developing a much wider base of confidently numerate children.

There is much in the Numeracy Project that is theoretically sound, but soundness of theory in practice is what matters.

Perhaps it's time for the Numeracy Project gurus to take a long holiday, and for the keys to be taken off any gate-holders in our schools. It's time for fresh thinking!

NEMP: National Education Monitoring Project NMSSA: National Monitoring Study of Student Achievement PISA: Programme for International Student Achievement TIMSS: Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study

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Tuakana/Teina relationships as a basis for school improvement Helen Kinsey-Wightman

Last week as I picked my son up from childcare, his teacher called out, “I must tell you about something that happened today . . . ” Of course I naturally assumed the worst and prepared to give my son my best ‘patient but stern telling off face’! In this situation I’m never sure whether it’s better to be the ‘teacher who is the parent of the naughty child’ or the ‘teacher who has to talk to the teacher who is the parent of the naughty child’ – having been in both situations at various times they are equally excruciating.

Anyway on this occasion, miraculously it was good news! She told me that earlier two of the younger children had been having an argument over a toy car – the teacher went over to ask if they needed help to decide what to do – they told her that my son could help them. So, over he went, armed with the wisdom of an almost 5 yr old Solomon, he gave the car to the boy who had it first and took the second boy, Olly, to the construction box and helped him to make an even better car. I told Manu how proud I was that he was being such a great tuakana and looking after the teina.

The emphasis his Kohanga Reo places on the tuakana (literally older sibling) of being a kind and supportive role model to those who are younger clearly benefits both parties. However, lest I become too effusive in my maternal pride, I must tell you that 5 minutes later when an older boy tried to take the car he had made from Olly, Manu picked it up and bashed him firmly on the knuckles with it before handing it back – so there may be some work to do on his peer relationships!

Over the last term I have been continuing to reflect on the subject of mentoring and – embracing the risk of sounding like an education workshop facilitator – I have been surprised by the areas of our school lives that can be usefully viewed through a mentoring lens. A recent workshop on fostering equity in education held at Massey has had me thinking about IES in the context of mentoring.

Now, I realise opinions from my countrymen are starkly divided on the attributes of Palmerston North – with Jeremy Clarkson waxing lyrically and irreverently on our beloved God’s own, “If you were God and you were all-powerful, you wouldn’t select Bethlehem as a suitable birthplace for your only child because it’s a horrible place . . . What you’d actually do is choose New Zealand.” If God had got it right, he wrote, ‘children at Christmas time today would be singing “Oh little town of Wellington” and people would not cease from mental fight until Jerusalem had been built in Auckland’s green and pleasant land. Jesus would have been from Palmerston North,’ he continued – in stark contrast to the slating the city received from another famous Briton, John Cleese, in 2006, when he said, “if you wish to kill yourself but lack the courage to, I think a visit to Palmerston North will do the trick”.

Despite the fact that John Cleese has a better track record in the ‘Not bashing your producer’ department, perhaps since it is 36

N Z P r i n c i p a l | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 15

my chosen place of work, I prefer to side with Jeremy and extol Palmerston’s virtues – particularly when it comes to the benefit of having Massey University on our doorstep with the access to speakers and experts this provides.

Last week, a colleague and I attended a workshop run by Prof.

Mel Ainscow from the University of Manchester where he has the interesting job title of Co-Director of the Centre for Equity in Education. On the basis that school systems which focus on both excellence and equity result in the highest performance, he firmly believes that when it comes to improving school systems and increasing equity, the knowledge already exists within schools and hence the school system about how to do this – it is simply a matter of moving that knowledge around.

He spoke about his work on the Greater Manchester Challenge a project which followed on from the City Challenge in London led by Prof. Tim Brighouse.

When a group of Principals whose schools were performing well were set the task of improving schools throughout the Greater Manchester area, their solution was to pair schools up to develop what I saw as a mentoring, tuakana/teina relationships.

They set up a “dating agency” to partner schools to develop projects that valued schools’ local context and the areas they were successful in as well as focussing on the need for improvement.

The resulting partnerships were sometimes surprising, he talked about the high achieving, high decile Girls’ School and the low decile co-ed with a falling roll and the small wealthy Jewish Boys’ primary and the large neighbouring Muslim school. Significantly, both partners were changed and improved through the partnerships – in the Jewish school teachers began to focus more on the creative arts they saw modelled in the curriculum at their partner school and student achievement improved at both schools.

In the schools where improvement was shown, the keys to the project’s success were the fact that the partnered schools were not in competition for students, the compatibility between the 2 principals and the focus on collaboration with a critical edge ie the willingness to share achievement data and ask the hard questions.

As feedback begins to come in about the first IES partnerships and as schools in our area meet to discuss possible collaboration, I wonder whether the kind of collaboration that IES is producing will result in relationships with a critical edge and improvement across the New Zealand system or whether we need to look more critically at the elements of school collaboration that create improvement and how we can implement those ideas in a uniquely New Zealand context.

Towards Self Improving School Systems: Lessons from a City Challenge. Mel Ainscow 2015 http://www.3news.co.nz/entertainment/top-gear-host-raves-about-nzin-column-2013031708#ixzz3gCX4iVX9

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