(August 2009)  The 2008-2009 year has seen continued expansion of the range of engagement with members through the Mahi tika employment relations education courses, the curriculum support days, and the usual range of conferences and training sessions that has become the hallmark of the PPTA year. Membership has remained at the historically high level of around 17,500 during the 2008-2009 year. Pleasing as this is, we are not complacent about membership numbers and know that we must constantly seek to meet members’ needs and expectations and to accurately reflect their views.

The 2006-2007 year has been one of consolidation for PPTA. There has been a steady growth in membership, a strengthening of the association’s financial position and a rising public profile. The 2004-2007 collective agreements for secondary teachers, area schools teachers, secondary principals and area school principals expired on 30 June 2007. Although the gains from the workstream process were not as great as Executivewould have wished there have been annual salary increases for members and some important achievements in the professional sphere. Time will tell whether the MoE and the Labour-led government are prepared to commit to a non-industrial path for the next three years.

The 2007-2008 year was notable for the renegotiation of PPTA’s five collective agreements: secondary teachers, secondary principals, area school teachers, area school principals and the adult and community education (ACE) coordinators and tutors. ...    PPTA remains concerned about the inability of the Ministry of Education to adequately support senior secondary curriculum development. It only responds when this lack of support turns into public failure via the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA). After the 2005-6 NCEA debacle it was able to fund a national coordinator for subject associations and 24 senior subject advisors. By October 2007, the ministry had judged that the crisis was over, and withdrew the funding for both the subject association coordinator and the senior subject advisors.