13 November 2019

A National Government will lift the quality of teaching and learning in New Zealand because we know a good education creates opportunities, National’s Education spokesperson Nikki Kaye says.

“National values teachers and the role they play in the development of our children. We know one of the single biggest differences that can be made in how well a child does is the quality of their teacher.

“We will focus on ensuring we attract and retain quality teachers and ensure they have ongoing professional development and support for children with complex needs to continue to help change lives.

“Last year Simon Bridges announced a National Government would reduce class sizes in primary schools. Today we have recommitted to this policy and released draft student-teacher ratios for consultation. We believe smaller class sizes will help reduce the workload teachers have.

“Reducing class sizes means we need more teachers. We are proposing a number of ways, including financial incentives, to attract more people to the profession or to get people to return to teaching. We understand the need to have strong recruitment and retention policies to ensure we can deliver the teachers we need.

“We are also considering changes to initial teacher training which include strengthening practicum requirements, accredited schools involved in teacher training and more support for teachers who mentor beginning teachers.

“A quality education comes from our teachers, but it also comes from strengthening the Curriculum. We want local curriculum to thrive and teachers to have world class curriculum resources.

“The document reinforces our commitment to ensure more young people are reading, support for science and technology and languages.

“We support progress reporting and ensuring parents have reliable and trusted information about how their children are doing.

“National knows that if we support teachers through smaller class sizes, if we have a strong curriculum, high quality training, our teachers will have the tools, skills and time to ensure our young people get the best possible education in New Zealand.”

The discussion document can be found here.

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