Posted by: blogger
on Mar 12, 2010
Tagged in: Tertiary Education Commission , TEC , PPTA Blog , Night classes , Ministry of Education , education spending , education politics , budget , Anne Tolley , Adult education , ACE
By Observer
This government doesn’t seem to have the slightest commitment to the idea that employers should act in good faith or that the State Sector Act 1988 (s77A) requires schools to “operate a personnel policy that complies with the principles of being a good employer”.
When it announced its poorly thought-through decision to can ACE (night schools) funding within the 2010 year, it appears to have had no clue as to how schools were meant to pay redundancy costs except that they should use whatever spare ACE money they had. Even a quick risk analysis would have told them that schools would not have enough to pay if the employees had had a lengthy period of employment.
Posted by: blogger
on Feb 10, 2010
By Flying Pig
Last month PPTA was notified that the Quality Teaching Partnership Fund (QTPF) will be the latest casualty of cost-cutting at the Ministry of Education.
The QTPF is a fund that has supported the last two subject association forums by covering the cost of accommodation for participants. PPTA also had funding from it for one of our professional conferences.
Posted by: blogger
on Feb 4, 2010
By Winged Avenger
2010 should be all about the NZ curriculum. Instead, the government is determined to railroad teachers into focusing on national standards.
Secondary teachers already know the downsides of too much summative assessment and league tables, both of which are key features of the national standards.
Teachers want to use the NZC as a platform for developing great teaching for diverse learners; parents want plain-English reporting of their kids’ progress. Neither group needs the national standards to achieve these goals.
Posted by: blogger
on Dec 22, 2009
By Winged Rodent
At a time when the world focuses on the dangers of climate change, the government appears to be going green - by recycling its spending this Christmas.
We could see the $200 million 'budget' allocated to fighting truancy and crime among teens as a form of "up-cycling” – a term coined to describe "the creation of a product with higher intrinsic value from a material at the end of its service life."
In other words, it is taking an empty ice-cream container, covering it with glitter and calling it a present.
Posted by: blogger
on Dec 9, 2009
Tagged in: vouchers , Tomorrow's Schools , teachers , privatisation , private schools , power , politics , Performance pay , education spending , education , Don Brash , 2025 taskforce
Don Brash is famous for two things
By ToilandTrouble
- His willingness to use race in order to advance his campaign for political power in 2005, and:
- His ability to survive for many weeks on a diet of corned beef and frozen peas.
He is also an economist and we know how many of them it takes to change a light bulb (none, the darkness will cause the light bulb to change itself). In sum he is overwhelmingly under-qualified to comment on educational matters. That doesn't matter though because economists are immune to intellectual humility, untroubled by their own ignorance and always ready to draw a crooked line from an unproved assumption to a forgone conclusion.
Posted by: blogger
on Nov 3, 2009
By Peter Sumpter
A scientist was researching cockroaches. He trained one to jump out of a petrie dish each time it heard the command “Jump”. He then removed its legs and repeated the experiment. On the command “Jump” it stayed motionless in the dish. This proves scientifically that if you take the legs off a cockroach it will go deaf.
Most high schools have larger classes for their high achieving and well motivated students, allowing the school to have smaller classes for low achieving students or students who require learning support.
Enter New Zealand’s leading educational researchers to survey the students. The statistics clearly show that the highest achieving students came from a class of 30 taught by teacher A, while the lowest achieving students come from a class of 18 taught by teacher B.
Posted by: blogger
on Oct 30, 2009
By Winged Avenger
Q. when is a voucher not a voucher?
A. when it’s a bulk fund.
Q. when is a voucher also not a voucher?
A. when it means the removal of zoning.
Q. when is a voucher good for education?
A. so far, never…
So, what is a voucher?
“Vouchers” describes various systems that place school funding in the hands of students and families. The idea is that each student is entitled to access education up to a set value each year. This value is issued in the form of a voucher. The student takes the voucher to their chosen school and redeems it for their education.
Posted by: blogger
on Aug 14, 2009
By The Flying Pig
Has anyone else noticed how much school property money goes into flash administration blocks these days?
You arrive at a school and are greeted by a receptionist behind a huge counter in a spacious area with soft couches, huge pot plants and a groaning cups cupboard. This admin area can be miles from the rest of the school, and sometimes without even an internal connection between it and the rest of the school.
Posted by: blogger
on Jul 24, 2009
By Winged Rodent
While perusing today's letters to the Dominion Post we were taken with this particularly astute piece:
NZ often beats Australia
If New Zealand ever had occasion to set up a Truth Ministry, Business Roundtable chief Roger Kerr would surely have to be its first chief executive.
Not content with regularly misrepresenting the operation of education vouchers in Sweden, he has now recast the results of international testing to put Australia typically ahead of New Zealand (Business Forum, July 20).
Posted by: blogger
on Jul 17, 2009
By the Winged Avenger It's not unusual for people who have been out of schools for 25 years (and more) to whinge about declining education standards. Before they get too carried away with knocking 21st century schools, perhaps they should take some time to think about their education system - the one that left them unable to tell the difference between a donation and a fee; between an act of choice and one of compulsion. For now, though, let's try and keep it simple, at least for the sake of the less well educated amongst us; and, to be fair to our teachers of yesteryear, for those who seem to have forgotten much of what they were so painstakingly taught.
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