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Expert Research Backs Up National Standards Concer
Expert Research Backs Up National Standards
Concern
The education sector union NZEI Te
Riu Roa says expert research on National Standards backs up
the deep concern being expressed by principals and teachers
and proves that they are doing thousands of children a
disservice.
The New Zealand Council for Educational Research has found that about 35 percent of Year 8 students will not reach the National Standard in maths despite making normal or satisfactory progress for their age on the Progressive Achievement Test.
“Principals and teachers have been expressing concern about this mismatch since the National Standards were released. The research confirms that our concern has not been misplaced and identifies some of the problems we have been flagging.”
“We all want to raise the achievement of our students but this report shows that rather than targeting underachieving students, National Standards call into question the progress of the average student and tell perfectly competent children that they are failing. The result will be to paint a very distorted and misleading picture of the underachieving tail.”
The Government says that National Standards have been designed so that students who meet them will be on track to achieve NCEA Level 2.
“That’s not going to make any sense to the majority of Year 8 students who will simply take away the message that they are below Standard,” says Ms Nelson.
“The real consequence is that children are being penalised for not meeting a set of National Standards which are untrialled and don’t have enough evidence to support confidence in them.”
Once again NZEI is calling on the Government to set up a robust process in which teachers and principals can be involved in sorting out the ongoing confusion around National Standards.
ENDS
NZEI Te Riu Roa
New Zealand Educational Institute
NZEI Te Riu Roa members work in every community in New Zealand, leading and advocating for quality public education.
We are the 50,000 principals, teachers and support staff who work in primary, area and secondary schools as well as early childhood centres, special education and school advisory services. We come together as NZEI Te Riu Roa - New Zealand's largest education union, a Treaty based organisation and a powerful advocate for quality public education.
We have the most important job in New Zealand - educating for the future.
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