School Choice Report Equals Bad Choice

School Choice Report Equals Bad Choice for Education

The education sector union NZEI Te Riu Roa says the government should make the right choice for education and ignore an ideologically-driven report on school choice.

An interparty working group made up of ACT, National and Maori Party MPs has released its Step Change report, aimed at finding policy options “to increase parental choice and focus on successful student achievement”.

It proposes giving the bottom 20 percent and the top 5 percent of students the choice to become a so-called “client of a learning broker mentor” attached to a specific institution or professional association.

NZEI says the report is a convoluted mish-mash of ideas taken from a previous era and modelled on overseas systems, such as American charter schools and English academies. Just like the government’s National Standards policy, those systems have no proven success in raising student achievement.

“This would simply be a voucher system in disguise, driven by political ideology rather than what is best for children’s learning,” says NZEI President Frances Nelson.

“It’s a band-aid approach using a business model which will suck money out of public education.”

The working group wants to see its recommendations implemented as quickly as next year.

However Frances Nelson says the government would be making an unconscionable mistake if it let the confused proposals in the report see the light of day.

ENDS

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