Rehash of tired clichés?
PPTA News February 2010 p. 7
Step Change: Success the only Option - the Report of the Inter-Party Working Group for School Choice is being released today Tuesday 16th Feb 2010
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A secretive group has been working behind the scenes as part of the National/ACT confidence and supply agreement to promote greater privatisation in education.
The brief for the Inter-Party Working Group for School Choice is to “consider and report on policy options relating to the funding and regulation of schools that will increase parental choice and school autonomy”.
PPTA president Kate Gainsford believes the outcomes are predetermined.
“It will be nothing but a rehash of the tired clichés about choice and privatisation that ACT pedals in lieu of an education policy,” she said.
The group comprises Roger Douglas, Chester Borrows, Hekia Parata, Te Ururoa Flavell and Heather Roy as chair.
“The detail of the sweeping and self-interested changes to education they recommend remain to be seen,” Kate said.
The group first met on 27 May 2009 and has been meeting ever since. It was due to report back in November last year, but to PPTA’s knowledge, at the time of printing, no such report has been published.
The terms of reference of the group allows its members to “enhance their educational understandings by commissioning research or obtaining information from the Ministry of Education”.
The ministry however appears not to have heard of the group and there have been no tenders for research Kate said.
“So we must assume that they feel no need of any expertise in the subject.”
The parties’ confidence and supply agreement says:
“ACT notes that National has stated that it will work, over time, to increase the education choices available to parents and pupils so families have more freedom to select schooling options … ACT also favours greater choice and competition in education in pursuit of these goals … currently the main National Party policy in this area is an increase in funding for independent schools”.
It was doubtful the report would have anything new to say about improving educational opportunities for the underprivileged, Kate said.
“ACT’s crocodile tears about the fate of the poor are designed to distract attention from the real purpose of the exercise, which is to get the taxpayer to pick up the full cost of educating children of the wealthy in their elite and selective private schools.
“Of course there will be some popular schools that will reject, out of hand, students with behavioural or learning difficulties in a system that encourages superfi cial measures of educational success in a competitive environment,” Kate said.
“We understood exactly what the government’s ‘priorities’ were the very moment a fast decision was made to send $35 million dollars to private schools at the same time massive cuts across the public education sector were signalled.
“Roger Douglas is fond of recommending that we follow the Swedish model – but is careful to avoid mentioning that the top tax rates in Sweden are 60%, which means they have money to invest in ensuring every school is well funded and effective, not the winners and losers system he prefers,” she said.
The other important difference is that in Sweden schools must take all comers and cannot cherry pick the students that would bring them the most academic, cultural or sporting success, she said.
“Everywhere you look in New Zealand, yet another report emerges bemoaning the duplication, wastefulness and incoherence of the New Zealand schooling system.
“The Tomorrow’s Schools market model, supposed to create perfect balance, consistency and order, has instead seen the squandering of the scarce education dollar on competition and balkanisation.
“What is called for is a proper review that provides certainty of direction matched against ethical practice and sound educational thinking not, as professor John Hattie says, ‘a nineteenth century British public school model’,” she said. ▪
 PPTA News February 2010
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