Hon Steven Joyce
Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills & Employment
Hon Hekia Parata
Minister of Education

29 August 2012 Media Statement
Ministers launch BPS education action plans

Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment Minister Steven Joyce and Education Minister Hekia Parata today released two action plans which detail the Government’s work to achieve the Better Public Service targets of boosting skills and employment.

The Result Action Plans – 5 and 6 – were announced by the Ministers at the Wellington Institute of Technology (WelTec) in Petone.

Mr Joyce says further boosting education achievement at the tertiary level will allow New Zealand to develop a more highly skilled workforce that will lead to increased economic growth.

“We know that an individual’s income premium increases with each level of
qualification they attain. We therefore want to strive for higher levels of achievement for our young people,” Mr Joyce says.

“We expect that to achieve the 55 per cent target for 25-34 year olds who hold a qualification at level 4 or above, we’ll need to have around 11,000 more people with higher level qualifications compared to current forecasts.

“To achieve this, the Government is targeting three key areas: further increasing enrolments across the tertiary sector; improving quality and achievement rates; and increasing transparency by publishing performance indicators for tertiary providers.

“This work fits into the Government’s wider Business Growth Agenda of building a highly skilled workforce.”

Ms Parata says it’s essential to provide school children with an education that gives them opportunities and choices for a successful future.

“Right now four out of five kids are successfully getting the qualifications they need from school and we must celebrate their success and the professionals in our system who make that possible every day. But our Government’s education plan is about getting five out of five.

“We want all our kids to be leaving school with the skills they need to reach their potential and to see 85 per cent of young people achieving a quality level 2 qualification, ensuring more than 7,000 additional school learners have a passport to a better life,” Ms Parata says.

“To help support this target a dedicated taskforce has already been established within the Ministry of Education to work with schools and other organisations.

“We have also announced Public Achievement Information which enables parents to see how their child’s school is performing and will allow the Government to see how well the system is doing as a whole in order to raise achievement for all learners.

“The raising of achievement of all our learners is at the forefront of all our plans to boost skills and jobs in our kids’ future.”

Both Result Action Plans highlight the importance of close, on-going collaboration between the education sector, communities and industry.

The action plans will be supported by several agencies including the Ministry of Education, the Tertiary Education Commission and the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.

The Result Action Plans are available at:
http://www.minedu.govt.nz/
~/media/MinEdu/Files/TheMinistry/BetterPublicServices/BPSYoungPeopleWEB.pdf

http://www.minedu.govt.nz
/~/media/MinEdu/Files/TheMinistry/BetterPublicServices/BPS25To34YrOldsWEB.pdf

ENDS

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