Claire Amos

The last three school years have been like no other. 2022 has been particularly hard as teachers trudge their way out of two and half plus years of attempting to keep students engaged and learning through waves of COVID-19, rolling lockdowns, evolving hybrid teaching and learning practices, whilst also battling their own bouts of COVID-19, widespread winter illnesses and a rollercoaster of stress, anxiety, existential despair. It is no wonder we have a workforce who is fast running out of steam (and some even running out of the sector). Add to this the veritable tsunami of change on the educational horizon and you soon get the sense that we may very quickly be dealing with an educational zombie apocalypse.   The future of the teaching workforce? I have already written about my concerns regarding the waves of educational change that is about to wash through the educational landscape and until recently was convinced it was simply a matter of prioritising the NZC refresh before we...

Source Yesterday I found myself having a rather visceral response to Christopher Luxon sharing his visit to Michaela School whilst he visited London. Whilst the school is not my cup of tea (in terms of educational philosophy) it wasn't actually the school that concerned me, it was more what the visit represented when combined with a visit to the rightwing think tank Policy Exchange. At just over a year out from election, now is the time for each of the parties to start circling the wagons and laying out what they will each offer should they get voted into government. Knowing that Luxon was actively seeking policy ideas when he visited what is known as " the strictest school in Britain " and that he then posted and raved about how great it was is more than a little concerning, particularly when schools in Aotearoa are working so hard to decolonise their contexts and develop a genuinely responsive "local curriculum".  As I sit here and ponder what National might b...

De Mere Berryman From the SPANZ programme: Understanding contexts for learning where equity and belonging can be a reality for Māori means coming to deeply understand historical events that have seen the systematic belittlement and redefinition of Māori identities through colonisation. Upon this historical legacy of cultural harm, school policies were imposed this century, so that we would step up (Ka Hikitia) and establish educational structures where Māori learners could ‘enjoy and achieve education success as Māori’. Today contexts for learning have seen mātauranga Māori being appropriated and applied across the system. Courageous leaders, who commit to making the aspirations of Ka Hikitia a lived reality in their schools, are ensuring that this generation of Māori learners is better served by education. Importantly they have also shown the benefits that ensue for Māori can be for all.  Article from RNZ:  https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/the-weekend/audio/201867765...

Peggy Burrows From the SPANZ programme: In 2010, I undertook a PhD research project to investigate why disparities existed in the achievement levels of Māori students and their Pākehā peers. As an educational leader I wanted to explore the Aoteoroa New Zealand educational landscape in an attempt to understand why these disparities occurred. I framed my study as an autoethnography, because I wanted to explore my own learning as I grappled with assumptions, ideas and theories that existed outsidde my personal sphere of experience around why Māori ākonga/students consistently failed in the school system.  Over a two year period, from 2010 to 2012, I collected anecdotes shared with me by Māori ākonga/students, whānau/parents, kaimahi/staff and board members about their experiences of school life. I recorded the anecdotes as vignettes then coded and grouped them according to recurring themes I identified. The five most significant recurring themes evident were: ahurea tuakiri/cultural i...

  Dr Melissa Gilbert-Smith From the SPANZ programme: Sure we have a relationship with a local GP clinic from whom we contract a nurse for a number of hours each day. This means that we also able to take students to the clinic outside of those times to see a GP directly and have a prescription filled as necessary. If the student is not enrolled with a GP this offer is made to the whanau. The school pays for a med tech license which means all the students information is entered on the system at the school end and his GP gets the notes if he is seen by the nurse. We are also able to claim funds from ACC and this offsets the cost of the nursing hours.   We went this way because of the number of boys who didn’t come to school if they were sick combined with many of our boys not having a GP so attendance improved and the boys did not miss time off school. We also had poor outcomes with the PHO provided nurse as this was a service more focussed on gathering youth health stats th...

  Day Three at SPANZ and one thing is becoming patently clear - it's time to get loud (or in my case, louder 😂) because, at the risk of sounding like a certain questionable church leader, enough is enough. As a country we are staring down the barrel of a whole litany of education initiatives that have the very real potential to do more damage than good. Particularly in the secondary space.  Issue #1 - An unnecessary NCEA Change Package We have an NCEA Change package that has the potential to streamline and homogenise senior programmes by providing so little choice in each learning area by reducing each subject to four, seemingly sequential, standards that if delivered as they are currently designed will see students completing a raft of portfolios and assessments in Term Three and Four. My issue is that the current system isn't actually broken, in fact we are seeing many schools already addressing over assessment by stepping away from Level One or moving to semesters to manag...

A typical Year 11 Course at EGGS in 2020  A journey... Context  We support NCEA - credit for both internal and external Entry to competitive courses internationally Time for learning? Level One provides... 3 years of constant assessment 3 plus more at tertiary level at the majority Thoughts Gaining time for learning - 10 weeks Reduce the sense of having to rush to 'get through' the curriculum in Year 11 Opportunity to provide strong, deep learning in Year 9-11 Reducing burden of over-assessment Provide experience in NCEA Undertake Numeracy Why, How and What... Why change? How to embrace. How to effect the change. What was hard? What are we seeing and learning? Process Blue skies thinking Consultation More consultation Meetings with depts Individualised needs discussed Mathematics did a full year  Regular updates to board Community Process Student input Evening presentations  Ask a question doc shared before hand Emailed information to parents Newsletter Information t...

  Laurayne Tafa - Education Consultant, Cognition Education Mihimihi/Acknowledgements - Laurayne acknowledged the work of Dr Russell Bishop and the work on which her presentation is based.  Link to Teaching to the North-East - Relationship-based and his writing of his upcoming book - Leading to the North-East.  'o le alai le pule o le tautua' - The pathway to leadership is through service. Acknowledgement of Barbara Ala'alatoa. Shout out to Kiri Turketo for convincing Laurayne (and Damon) to attend.  Leaders who accelerate equity: Five key success factors 1. Recognise and reject any deficit theories for these disparities   Leaders who can recognise and reject deficit language, theories and discourses are not debilitated by the downward spiral effect.  Equal support and equal status for ākonga Māori and mātauranga Māori. Integrating the hidden curriculum discourse.  2. Know where disparities exist - and target why they exist. Knowing how your system is ...

  Toeolesulusulu Damon Ieremia Salesa is the first Pacific vice chancellor at a New Zealand university, at Auckland University of Technology. What New Zealand needs to have learned from COVID-19.  What we need to be better at.  An unequal storm COVID amplified inequalities in housing, income and wealth Had a particular effect on Auckland families on Māori and Pasifika The impact will endure after COVID is normalised, particularly in education Education as a nexus of the challenge: a place where exisiting inequalities can be concretised or addressed But education was already one of the most unequal and racialised dimensions of NZ life We already had a schooling system that furthers the disadvantaged poor and brown students Inclusivity and Universities NZ universities have been places were privilege has been credentialised and further advantaged A large proportion of quality, lifelong and well paid jobs are accessed through a university education Universities are built on a...

Image: elanabsl / Shutterstock Today marks the first day of the SPANZ (Secondary Principals of Aotearoa, New Zealand) Conference 2022. First things first, hats off to the conference organisers for a way more diverse (and IMO way more exciting) key note line up. Last year I was so incensed by the line up I wrote this . I want to thank SPANZ for taking it on the chin and whilst I have no idea if it even vaguely influenced the shift we see this year, I would like to acknowledge the awesome keynote speaker line up of Laurayne Taufa, Dr Damon Salesa and Dr Mere Berryman alongside the Minister and the Harrison Stone team. The letter below isn't directly about SPANZ but it does capture what is chewing me up as I set foot into this year's conference. Below is a slightly tweaked "open letter" version of an email I sent to the Ministry of Education and the Minister last week. As the tumbleweeds blow through my inbox as I await any kind of acknowledgement or reply, I thought it ...