Category: PPTA

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“The Associate Minister says the programme could be more efficient and seems intent on making severe cuts to it,” says PPTA Te Wehengarua President Chris Abercrombie. “However, schools that I’m aware of, say none of the food goes to waste and they way in which it is delivered has significant benefits.”

Secondary principals have told PPTA that there has been a noticeable improvement in student behaviour as a result of the healthy lunch programme. “They say there has been a significant decrease in the numbers of  entries recorded into student behaviour management systems during lunch and after lunch, which means that students are less disruptive and more ready to learn.”

Chris Abercrombie said teachers strongly discouraged any moves to target the programme to those who needed it the most. “The fact that everyone in the school is part of the lunch programme means there is no stigma attached to it. If it’s targeted, you can guarantee that kids will feel ashamed to access it – and many won’t.”

Another significant benefit of the programme was the local employment it generated in many communities. “This government says it is determined to get people into work – and this programme does.

“Again, we would urge Mr Seymour to go to some schools in Porirua or South Auckland  and talk to teachers and ākonga about the programme, and the benefits of it, before he makes any decisions about it.”

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“Honouring our Te Tiriti obligations has resulted in huge improvements in ākonga Māori achievement,” says Te Aomihia Taua-Glassie, PPTA Te Wehengarua Māori vice president. “The establishment of kura kaupapa Māori, wharekura and kura a iwi in our public education system has enabled so many rangatahi to thrive and achieve amazing results through the medium of te reo Maori.

“We have a culturally responsive context for learning, and Te Ao Haka, pōwhiri, whakatau led by rangatahi with the support of their mana whenua, Ngā Manu Kōrero and the frequent use of te reo Māori are part and parcel of everyday school life for all our ākonga today – hoino we can still go further.”

PPTA Te Wehengarua president Chris Abercrombie said secondary teachers supported the growth of a secondary education system that promotes and enhances Māori success as Māori. “Schools must be places where ākonga Māori and their whānau feel a sense of belonging and connection.”

In 1974, the then PPTA Te Wehengarua national executive approved the recommendation from the Māori Language Panel to support the principle that the course of every pupil in New Zealand should contain elements of Māori culture. “Fifty years on we have mana ōrite mō te mātauranga Māori giving equal status for mātauranga Māori in NCEA. We have a history curriculum that educates all rangatahi in Aotearoa New Zealand about our colonialist past and its devastating long-term effects on Māori, and that involves working with local marae to get a real understanding of local history. We have other curriculum changes that connects ākonga Māori to educational content that validates who they are as Māori.”

Local iwi and hapū need to be supported by the Ministry of Education so they can engage with schools to develop resources that will ensure mātauranga Māori is authentic and endorsed. School leadership should be able to access professional learning and advice on how best to partner with mana whenua to achieve an authentic Te Tiriti relationship.

Te Aomihia Taua-Glassie says secondary teachers are deeply concerned that 50 years of real progress could be about to be rolled back significantly by this government through changes to the curriculum, a refusal to value Te Reo Māori and a refusal to acknowledge that to get equitable outcomes, Māori rangatahi need approaches that reflect partnership and Te Ao Māori.

“Along with many of those who will gather at Waitangi tomorrow, secondary teachers are apprehensive about the government’s stance on Te Tiriti and the implications for our motu, particularly our education system and our ākonga. We urge the government to reflect on all that has been achieved through our affirmation and advancing of Te Tiriti.

“I kī mai to matou tupuna no Te Taitokerau, Tā Hemi Henare, “Kua tāwhiti kē tō haerenga mai, kia kore koe e haere tonu he nui rawa ō mahi kia kore e mahi tonu.”

(As the famous Māori leader, Sir James Henare, said, ‘we have come too far not to go further, we have done too much not to do more’.)

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“The worsening shortage of secondary teachers shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. What is shocking is the failure of successive governments to do something meaningful and effective about it. We are really hoping this government will take a different approach and grasp the nettle. Every young person in Aotearoa New Zealand deserves a specialist teacher in every subject to enable them to acquire the knowledge and skills they need.”

Chris Abercrombie said it was good to see the Ministry of Education, in a teacher supply report released today, acknowledging that unless overall teacher numbers are increased, initiatives designed to spread them are relatively unhelpful. “Acknowledging that we are beyond the bandaids is an important step in making real headway in addressing our national supply problem, and through that taking pressure off our rural and hard to staff schools around the country, and giving all schools the opportunity to select suitably trained and qualified candidates in all subject areas.

“We also hope the Ministry will be more proactive in measuring and managing recruitment need by subject. There is no indication in the Ministry’s report of how many teachers are needed by subject, how many are currently available and how many are projected to be available going forward. A surplus composed of, for example, Physical Education teachers, does not meet the needs of schools and students and can lead to long term problems when schools are pressed to appoint teachers to positions that their subject qualifications are not suited to.

“Secondary teaching is an amazing job. However, relative wages for secondary teachers continue to fall and employment has remained relatively strong. Workload pressures and ongoing disruption remain disincentives for many teachers. These combine to make secondary teaching less attractive to many potential teachers and also to teachers reconsidering their careers.

“The Government must  ensure that our Initial Teacher Education centres are full of well qualified and highly inspired new graduates across the subject areas we need, and in numbers that allow schools to have a genuine choice of applicants across all subject areas There needs to be a fundamental shift in how the government approaches salaries and conditions, and supports for teaching and learning and staffing levels in secondary and composite schools.”

Chris Abercrombie said he hoped the Government would give serious consideration to the recommendations of the 2023 Arbitration Panel and to the findings of the 2021 SPC secondary school staffing report in this regard.

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“We wholeheartedly support the protest being held today against the repeal of this law.

Scrapping legislation such as this takes Aotearoa New Zealand from being a world leader to a lemming.

“The impacts of smoking and vaping in schools are persistent and require significant resources to address. The promise of a smokefree generation was a tangible example of social and health issues being sorted at a community level rather than being left for schools to try and manage. Repealing the legislation is a regressive step for schools and students.

“Actions speak so much louder than words. Scrapping this legislation, which was going to save up to 5000 lives each year, tells us clearly that the health and future of New Zealanders is not a priority for this government. Doing away with this ground-breaking law, as a short term fix to fund tax cuts that will not make a difference and that Aotearoa New Zealand can simply not afford, is an utter disgrace.”

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

Secondary teachers support today’s protest against the government’s plans to repeal Fair Pay Agreement legislation.

Fair Pay Agreements (FPAs) bring employer associations and unions together to bargain for minimum employment terms for all covered employees in an industry or occupation, particularly the lowest paid such as cleaners, hospitality workers, security staff and bus drivers.

“Scrapping fair pay laws will is all about putting more money in employers’ pockets, and rewarding businesses for their vote.  It will take Aotearoa New Zealand back to a low wage economy and put us back in the race to the bottom.

“Those who benefit the most from Fair Pay Agreements are people who work in jobs with inadequate working conditions, low wages, and low labour productivity. For example, Māori, Pacific peoples, young people, and people with disabilities are over-represented in jobs where low pay, job security, health and safety, and upskilling are significant issues. Barriers to good labour market outcomes are particularly prevalent for people who fall within more than one of those groups. Fair Pay Agreements help address these issues.

“Doing away with fair pay agreements shows very clearly where this government sits – and it is definitely not with people who are most in need of decent pay and working conditions. The fact that repealing fair pay legislation is one of the first items on this government’s agenda speaks volumes about who it represents – and it is not those who are struggling or financially squeezed in Aotearoa New Zealand.

“We urge the Government to think again – and think of the hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders in the lowest paid jobs seriously struggling to make ends meet – before it scraps fair pay and takes us back years.”

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“The main result PISA consistently shows is that if you are fortunate enough to be born into a financially comfortable family, you will do better academically.

“On the face of it, the results continue a pattern that has been trending downward for the last 20 years. However, when looking at these results we need to take the broader educational context into account.

“The old-school form of assessment PISA uses is becoming increasingly irrelevant here in Aotearoa New Zealand and many other countries around the world. This was demonstrated by the relatively low number of schools that took part – well short of the PISA target.

Chris Abercrombie said when the PISA assessments were done, in 2022, the world was in the midst of a pandemic and PISA was simply not a priority. “Definitely in Aotearoa New Zealand, it was an unnecessarily high stakes investment for low return for schools.

“Participation in PISA is voluntary here, and we have seen over the last several years an increasing unwillingness among students to do these assessments as they are not meaningful to them. In other countries, particularly those that have traditional styles of assessment, i.e. rote learning and multi-choice questions, participation in PISA is compulsory and students are actually trained in how to do the assessments.

Chris Abercrombie said schools in New Zealand did not need PISA. “Schools are more interested in raising achievement levels and ensuring better educational outcomes for all young people.

“I hope the government reads the writing on the PISA wall and realises that if it is serious about improving educational achievement, the most important thing it can do is address the widening gap between the haves and have nots in Aotearoa New Zealand.”

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“When asked by the media early last week about this policy, I said secondary teachers were not sure what the problem was that needed fixing. However, the Prime Minister’s comments, reported on Friday, give us cause for serious concern. None of the reasons he has given for the need for change are valid.”

Radio NZ reported on Friday that Mr Luxon said the government wanted a well-defined (health) curriculum, agreed to by experts that makes sure that the content is age-appropriate, requires parents to be consulted and that gives parents the right to withdraw their children from this education.

“All of these conditions currently apply to the relationship and sexuality education guidelines,” says Chris Abercrombie.

“The guidelines are evidence-based, coming with a separate pedagogical guide for teachers. The lead writer is an academic who is an expert in this field of knowledge, the guidelines are age appropriate – there are separate guidelines tailored for younger and older students – schools are required by the Education and Training Act to consult with their communities on the delivery of the health curriculum and parents can withdraw their children from all or part of it. 

“Not one of the reasons given by the Prime Minister appears to be valid. This is extremely disturbing given this change, initiated by NZ First,  was agreed to as part of the National Party’s coalition agreement with NZ First. We would have hoped the Prime Minister would have made sure there was a very sound rationale for this change before putting it in the agreement.”

Chris Abercrombie said the apparent lack of a valid rationale for the change set a very dangerous precedent. “Who’s to know whether the government will decide a little further down the track that the guidance for the science curriculum, or the social studies curriculum needs to be removed – for equally invalid reasons?”

PPTA Te Wehengarua intends to raise its concerns with the Minister of Education, Erica Stanford, at its first meeting with her soon.

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

Responding to Friday’s announcement of a new government and new coalition agreements, Chris Abercrombie said the vast majority of students in Aotearoa are in the public education system and this is where investment should be made.

In 2018 when charter schools were disestablished there were 808,439 students enrolled in the public system and around 1500 enrolled in charter schools.

“The focus on the government needs to be on ensuring we have a robust and equitable public education system. Our kura are at the very heart of our communities, and we must ensure that we build and develop the amazing work and ongoing possibility that exists within this system.

“All schools are focused on students achieving their best, it is vital that the government also understands that supporting the whole young person is key to maximising their potential.

“We will be looking at the coalition agreement in detail once it is released to see what commitments have been made to support public secondary education and what vision there is for secondary education for our rangatahi.”

Source: Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA)

“Three years of COVID disruptions, increasing concerns about climate change and the relentless influence of social media has resulted in increasing numbers of our students feeling vulnerable and anxious. Stress, depression and anxiety cannot be left at the school gate and are not conducive to learning.

“Helping rangatahi realise their potential and giving them the knowledge, skills and opportunities they need to live their best lives are what principals live for. Schools will pull out all stops to help students who are at risk and in need. We need more pastoral staffing in our schools to work with vulnerable students and their families and alternative education services to help them as much as possible to stay engaged with education – once they disengage it’s often very difficult to get them back.”

Kate Gainsford said the report had correctly identified teacher recruitment as another burning issue for principals. “There are serious problems with recruiting graduates into secondary teaching.

Every secondary student deserves  a subject specialist teacher and when schools are not able to provide that, it keeps principals awake at night. The Ministry needs to take its responsibilities for workforce planning very seriously.”

She was not surprised that the report found many principals were concerned about the management of the NCEA and curriculum changes. “The support and resourcing has been slow and piecemeal and teachers and ākonga deserve much better. Of course schools are doing everything they can to make the best of a sub-optimal situation. I sincerely hope that the voices of concern will begin to be heard. We all need to be able to have absolute confidence in our national curriculum and qualification.”

The pressure of these issues on principals aligns with the finding that only nine percent find their workload manageable. “Acute issues with vulnerable students, endless recruitment and having to untangle the NCEA change process chews up the hours in a day, leaving many principals working long hours to keep up. More structured and systematic support for leadership as well as resolving issues with the teacher shortage would go a long way to make workloads more manageable.”

National survey of secondary school principals