Tertiary education is in crisis in Aotearoa New Zealand. Vocational education, the domain of the Polytechnic ‘Institutes of Technology’; and Science and Humanities’ education, the traditional domain of the Universities.

2023 was an election year, yet tertiary education did not feature in the election campaign, despite these manifest crises. The Labour government was not interested in campaigning on its record, and for the mainstream media who frame election campaigns, the matter was not sexy enough. The media wanted a campaign largely restricted to fiscal holes, identity politics (especially bi-cultural divisions), and coalition-alignments (with a fascination for Winston Peters comparable with the fascination of the American media for Donald Trump).

(Occasionally health, education and climate change got into the election campaign discussion; but for health it was largely about constrained clinical services, in education it was about schools and possible curriculum impositions, and for climate change it was mainly about electric car subsidies. Nothing about the state of the population’s health, meeting New Zealand’s demographic challenges, the extent to which the consumers of education at all levels are disengaging with learning, addressing the lifestyle choices of the entitled minority, or fairly distributing the real cost burdens which we face.)

New Zealand’s underfunded universities are shedding staff in the public disciplines: humanities and public science. Once we were aspirational, or at least we wished to appear to be so, with Bright Future in 1999 and its predecessor, the Knowledge Society.

The Polytechnic Sector

The Te Pūkenga polytechnic saga is a scandal; a scandal attributable to former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins before he became Prime Minister. Yet his record in ministering to tertiary education was largely unremarked upon when he became Prime Minister, unopposed.

It was in the 1990s that the rot set in. Tertiary education became an export industry – not in itself a bad thing – which meant that this important public infrastructure increasingly came to be seen as a business (subject to private-market discipline) that just happened to do some intellectual public good as a side gig. The universities came to emulate polytechnics in that they increasingly emphasised professional vocational education over humanities; and they increasingly emphasised applied science over pure science.

Further, re the polytechnics, the governments either side of the millennium dropped the ball massively by not rebranding the leading polytechnics – as happened in Australia and United Kingdom – as Universities of Technology. For the polytechnics to be at the vanguard of a successful export-education model, they had to be branded as ‘universities’. So, for someone in Sri Lanka or Vietnam today – some young person who wants a good education which will gain them a good job in their home country – which was/is more attractive: University of Central Queensland at Rockhampton, or Manukau Institute of Technology?

New Zealand in 2023 has a tight labour market, though with unacceptably high levels of structural unemployment. The historical role of the New Zealand’s polytechnics has to address labour supply through reducing structural unemployment and structural underemployment; of upskilling the labour force. Yet this purpose of the polytechnic sector has been almost entirely absent from the minimal profile the sector has had in the mainstream media this decade so far; almost all I have heard is about financial losses, indicating the widespread perspective that the polytechnics are principally lame-duck businesses and only incidentally a critical part of the country’s educational infrastructure.

When such infrastructure is underfunded – the direct cause of the poor financial performance – two things happen. The polytechnic sector makes financial losses, the sector overinvests in a cost-management superstructure, and the sector gets restructured by the Ministry of Education. Service delivery – the sector’s raison d’être – becomes squeezed by the underfunding, management bloat, and top-down bureaucracy.

My impression has been that Treasury has been advocating a ‘free-rider’ policy; wishing to import skills from other countries, while seeking to suppressing investment in human capital on the grounds that employable educated Aotearoans can gain higher returns to themselves by emigrating. Such a free-rider policy is to be a net poacher of human capital; a poacher of people with employable skills.

In 2024 we, as a nation – as a mainstream liberal mediocracy – must start asking the right questions about the contributions that tertiary education can make to alleviating critical skills’ shortages. Labour supply is a critical component of a successful macroeconomy; and should not be addressed by austere monetary and fiscal policies which seek to suppress labour demand as a way of restoring balance to the labour market.

At least, in 2024, we have a Minister for Tertiary Education – Penny Simmonds – who understands the Polytechnic sector and its critical importance in addressing New Zealand’s labour supply problem.

The Polytechnic sector only made it through the media wall-of-silence this month because the cancelling of the Te Pūkenga project was just too big a story to ignore entirely. (Nevertheless, if I put ‘Te Pūkenga’ into the search facility of the New Zealand Herald android app, there are just two stories from 2023: one about a successful open day at UCOL’s Whanganui campus, 9 Aug 2023; and one from March about Microsoft facilitating the training of Māori and Pasifika for cybersecurity careers. Yet 2023 was an election year; a year in which the critical economic problem faced by this country was/is labour supply.)

The Universities

The previous government not only mangled the Polytechnic sector, it, also abandoned the University sector. (This abandonment took place despite, so much of the time since 2020, the government was saying “the science says …”.) While it had no functioning Minister of Tertiary Education – the Minister of Education in 2023 only really seemed to understand school education – the Government had a substantially underemployed Minister in Deborah Russell who could have been an excellent advocate for the universities, and their potential contribution to an evolving knowledge society. I trust that Penny Simmonds has a vision for universities – other than cost-cutting – while understanding that most of her ministerial bandwidth will be taken up with the polytechnic(s). The confirmation of Massey University’s retrenchment was discussed on RNZ today, 14 Dec, on Checkpoint: Massey University confirms it’s pressing ahead with its plans.

The new government needs to make an urgent and clear statement that it values the sciences and the humanities as public goods, and that the support of these civilisational cornerstone activities needs to be broader than cross-subsidies of university student fees.

Unitec

Unitec – formally Carrington Polytechnic, and which might have been better understood by non-Aucklanders had it been called West Auckland Institute of Technology – has suffered an appalling fate. Once New Zealand’s biggest Polytechnic – and the only tertiary educator of any note in West Auckland – Unitec became a land company around 2012. It became a campus with a Polytech as its main tenant. The first major problem was the Business School being turfed out of its purpose-built premises; premises which were then gutted by the new star tenant – multinational company IBM. Within about a year IBM abandoned its project, though the building continues to house a commercial tenant.

The polytechnic continued, doing great things despite underfunding and the machinations going on around the land which the government was coveting; and despite a burgeoning management superstructure, and its edict of ‘change management’. Eventually Unitec – a government owned land company cum polytechnic – was (unsurprisingly) practically bankrupt, and most of the land was sold to the government; and has subsequently been on-sold to a property development company.

The former campus is now a sorry site, and the property development scale and logistics will probably be unsurvivable for the tenant polytechnic; like a well-nourished rata tree strangling its host. This RNZ story this week Auckland urban development: complex manoeuvrings in Mt Albert gives a very pollyanna-ish take on the current state of this wonderful former green-space (and piece of Auckland’s history); now a ‘model’ “brownfield” development. (And we should note that, as well as suffocating Unitec – the tertiary educator, not the land bank – the development will surround the Mason Clinic, Aotearoa’s maximum-security psychiatric detention centre.)

My final plea is for the mainstream media to look at this ‘model’ property development with a critical eye, and see if it ‘cuts the mustard’ as a high density mixed-housing development. And to compare the potential of this ‘brownfields’ site with a nearby genuine brownfield site, the former Crown Lynn lands. Even if the former Unitec campus can be made to work as a modern tenement complex, will it have been worth the cost to the environment and to the educational infrastructure of West Auckland and Aotearoa New Zealand?

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Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

The chart shows what we in New Zealand would call the ‘progressive parties’ (ie leftwing) in red and green. Together they got 58 percent of the vote. What we in New Zealand would call a landslide win to the Left.

But no, the result was actually a landslide win to the Right – and quite a belligerent Right, given the new government’s propensity to cut back on government-funded services. The PC party scored 61 percent of the seats, leaving just 39 percent to the Left; the Conservatives are comfortably in charge in Ontario.

Canadian democracy is horribly distorted by the socalled ‘firstpastthepost’ voting system (never mind that the PCs never got close in Ontario to the 50% ‘post’ that constitutes a popular majority). Divided and ruledover is the fate of the Left in Ontario, and probably Canada too, especially when Ford moves over into Federal politics.

I cannot see much momentum to change. Ontario had a referendum in 2007. FPP soundly defeated MMP. A similar result (61% to 39%) occurred in British Columbia last year. Federal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau abandoned his party’s commitment to electoral reform soon after taking office in 2016. The only hope seems to be little Prince Edward Island, which did support MMP in a popular referendum in 2016, and will hold another in October this year.

In a socially progressive (but arithmetically challenged) country, the divided Left can only beat the remorseless FPP arithmetic when it throws up charismatic personalities (such as Trudeau) as its leaders.

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Exactly a year ago, on 6 March 2018, the government census was carried out. It was a “digital-first” census, with citizens expected to primarily use the internet to answer the compulsory questions about their lives. And it was soon apparent that huge numbers of New Zealanders had been missed out by the exercise – likely to be at least one in ten. 

But we are only now finding out how much of a debacle that event was, along with increasing knowledge of the seriously negative implications for our society and democracy. And to make matters worse, there’s a distinct lack of political or bureaucratic accountability for what has happened.

A number of newspaper stories have been published today about the anniversary of the 2018 census debacle. The most important is Thomas Manch’s 365 days and still counting: Census 2018 results nowhere to be seen. In this, he explains that “The 2018 census data release has been delayed three times due to low response rate” and “Statistics New Zealand remains tight-lipped about when the long-delayed results will be available”.

The article explains that the census operation resourcing was inadequate, especially in terms of the number of field staff hired to help people get their census filled out: “Newly released information shows Stats NZ employed 1800 enumerators, or field staff, to knock on doors and uncover those who failed to complete Census 2018. This was a substantial drop from the 7000 boots on the ground during Census 2013”.

A number of economists and statisticians explain the growing awareness of the severity of the “shambolic” census operations. For example, University of Auckland statistician Andrew Sporle is quoted saying: “It’s a bit of a disaster, we don’t know how bad, but we know it’s a disaster.”

Sporle explains that the data, once it’s eventually released, “will provide increased uncertainty in matters from the Government’s wellbeing targets to the number of Māori electorates.”

Manch looks at the Māori electorates in another article today, Māori electorate seat at risk due to Census 2018 debacle, and says that, due to the way Statistics NZ have run the census, there are likely to be much fewer respondents reporting that they are of have Māori descent, which could lead to one of the Māori seats disappearing.

One specialist is cited as saying that although the 2018 census participation rate is estimated to be about 90 percent for the general population, “the response rate of Māori may be as low as 80 or 70 per cent in some corners of New Zealand”. In addition, “more than 20 new iwi won’t be properly counted” in the census, and this is a problem because “census data was particularly important for smaller iwi trying to do good with fewer resources”.

Societal consequences of the census debacle

There are plenty of other serious implications if the census 2018 data is unreliable, as is increasingly expected. For example, planning and funding for health and education is highly reliant on this population data, and some hospitals and schools might receive inadequate resourcing as a result. Much of this is explained in Cate Broughton’s article today, Health boards, schools may lose funding as Ministries forced to use 2013 census data.

In this, University of Otago’s health systems expert Robin Gauld explains how hospitals might be negatively impacted: “It could have fairly profound implications for a DHB off a $1 billion dollar budget – if you’re a per cent or two off, that’s $10 or $20 million dollars, the difference between surplus and deficit.”

The article points out that this is likely to have a particularly adverse impact on poorer communities, with Child Poverty Action Group’s Alan Johnson quoted: “What you will get in places like South Auckland is there might be 10,000 – 15,000 people missing from the count – well the DHB won’t be getting funded for them so them and everyone else in that area will struggle with less funding.”

Currently the problems with the census data means that government departments are having to rely on 2013 census data. In terms of schools, the president of NZEI, Lynda Stuart, says: “If they are looking at using 2013 census data then yes potentially schools’ [funding levels] could stay the same and yet communities do change so it’s obviously highly problematic”.

So will the census debacle have a negative impact on social wellbeing? Certainly, the Government is making much of putting “wellbeing” at the centre of Grant Robertson’s upcoming Budget, but there must be questions as to the credibility of an approach that emphasises the need to measure social indicators when measures are so inadequate.

Furthermore, the Government has admitted that Robertson’s Budget won’t make use of the latest data: “Crucial funding decisions in Budget 2019 will be made without data from Census 2018” – see Thomas Manch’s Census data won’t make Budget 2019. National’s finance spokesperson, Amy Adams, says that this is “highly unusual”, but the Government has claimed that they never intended to use the new census data in the Budget.

Adams has also asked whether hospitals and schools which receive inadequate funding based on old data will eventually have their correct funding restored and backdated once the new data arrives.

Electoral consequences of the census debacle

The other major census headache is the upcoming general election, which is constitutionally-mandated to be run on the basis of electorate boundaries being redrawn in light of the census. The exercise of the boundary re-drawing is carried out by the Representation Commission (which effectively involves the Electoral Commission and representatives of the Labour and National parties). But if they don’t have access to the latest census data, or if the census data is deemed unreliable, then the whole exercise could collapse or lead to messy court proceedings.

This is best covered by Henry Cooke in his article, Statistics New Zealand confident census data will be ready for 2020 election boundaries. In this, National’s Electoral Reform spokesman Nick Smith challenges the robustness of the likely census data for the election, and says: “It is totally unsatisfactory to be determining electorate boundaries that can effectively determine who will be the next Government on the basis of guesswork”.

If National doesn’t have confidence in the census data being used to re-draw the electorates then the party could take legal action or simply pull out of involvement in the Representation Commission, which would collapse the whole process. This article says that National want the 2013 census data to be used instead, and “National was not ruling out ‘alternative action’ if this did not happen”.

A big issue is the matter of when Statistics NZ manages to get the data to the Electoral Commission, which is currently unknown. National’s David Farrar explains the problems with the timetable: “This would normally have been September 2018, so we’d have new boundaries by March 2019 – well before the election. If Stats NZ can’t release census data before say December 2019, then we’d have final boundaries in June 2020. That would be a disaster. Selections would have occurred by then. You can’t change boundaries just three months before an election. Parliament would probably have to legislate to delay the new boundaries until after the 2020 election. Ideally new boundaries should be finalised before election year. That means Stats NZ really needs to get the data out by June 2019. Any later than that and it will create a real headache for the boundaries review” – see: The census disaster gets worse.

Blame game and unaccountability

Given the anniversary of the 2018 census debacle, there is now a renewed interest in working out exactly what went so wrong a year ago and who is to blame. Journalists have had great trouble getting answers on any of this, because both the Government and Statistics New Zealand have been uncooperative and uncommunicative about what has happened.

But with the help of the Official Information Act, Newsroom’s David Williams has accessed 189 pages of information from Statistics New Zealand, which help illustrate the process during which the disaster unfolded – see his must-read account of “a digital-first experiment gone wrong”: Bungled, costly census to produce less ().

Williams has also been seeking comment from officials and politicians. He says “Stats NZ said no one was available for an interview.” And the Minister of Statistics James Shaw is asked “about his confidence in the integrity of the census data”, to which he rather weasily replies: “I am confident Stats NZ is making every effort and applying as many options as possible to deliver robust Census data.”

And a Statistics New Zealand official is interviewed, who says: “There is no accountability or responsibility being taken internally for what is turning out to be the worst census in over 50 years.”

For a very in-depth and interesting account of the census debacle, see the Otago Daily Times feature story, And then there were nine, by Bruce Munro, which was published in the weekend. This is, so far, the ultimate exploration of what went wrong.

Kathy Connolly, Stats NZ’s census general manager, answers questions put to her about whether the debacle was a result of the previous National Government running down the public service and replies “no comment”. Was the debacle due to Stats NZ being asked to “Go do a cheap census”? Again: “No further comment”.

There is also great debate in the article between Labour and National politicians about underfunding and oversight. They both blame each other, of course.

Munro also reports: “What exactly happened is hotly debated, but not loudly. Most of those close to the action will not talk on the record. At an operational level, when it came to rolling out New Zealand’s first largely online census, several wheels fell off, they say. There wasn’t enough publicity. Statistics New Zealand relied on the diminished postal system to get initial information to people. There were not enough forms. Fewer people were employed to follow up on those who had not filled out their form.”

In the end, the results of the census debacle are likely to impact negatively on the marginalised of society. In this regard, the views of the University of Otago’s professor of public health, Peter Crampton, are reported: “those for whom good social policy is of the highest priority” will be undercounted. The result will be a worsening of their position: “If these groups become invisible in the census then policy-making becomes doubly difficult and some of the least advantaged communities are at risk of becoming further marginalised.”

The decision by Statistics New Zealand to slash the number of census field workers is “beyond comprehension” according to economist Brian Easton – see his opinion piece today: Census mess can be resolved with a new one in 2021. But Easton argues that it’s quite feasible for the Government to get a robust new census up and running for the early date of 2021.

Finally, have Statistics NZ staff been spending too long “checking their privilege” instead of checking the pulse of the nation? Just before Christmas it was discovered that the government agency had their staff carry out a game to determine who was ‘white’, ‘Christian’, ‘able-bodied’, ‘male’, ‘heterosexual’ and had ‘no speech impediment’ – see Dan Satherley’s Stats NZ defends hosting ‘Check Your Privilege Bingo’ game.

by Dr Bryce Edwards

Many children were supposed to start back at school today – but how many actually turned up? On an average day in New Zealand schools, only 64 per cent of students show up. Many absences are obviously due to illness, but there are ill-effects from societal problems that are preventing children from getting a basic education. 

The attendance figures from the Ministry of Education came out last week for the 2018 school year. According to education reporter Josephine Franks, “the overall regular attendance rate was 63.8 per cent in 2018. That’s up slightly from 2017, when it sat at 63 per cent” – see: One-third of children regularly miss school. This report also says that “chronic absence continued to be more prevalent in lower socio-economic schools”.

A big part of the problem is poverty. The KidsCan charity argues that the cost of getting kids ready for school will prevent some students from attending on the first day. The charity’s chief executive Julie Chapman is reported today as arguing that “Some parents won’t send their children to school because they felt ashamed they can’t make ends meet”. Chapman also says: “Those that do go, start on the back foot because they don’t have the right clothes, and they’re hungry” – see Scott Yeoman and Zoe Hunter’s Tauranga families turn to foodbanks for school lunches.

According to the charity, “data shows that one in every five children in low-decile schools around New Zealand will head back to class this year without enough food.” Commenting on this, Greerton Village School principal Anne Mackintosh says “It is a grim state of affairs and a very sad indictment on what is happening socially, economically and politically to our children, our most vulnerable.” Furthermore, this article reports her believing that “schools had become more of a social agency by ensuring children had the necessities provided by volunteers”.

Another charity, Variety New Zealand, started fundraising last month in conjunction with the New Zealand Herald, so that school kids don’t miss out – see Natalie Akoorie’s Why sponsoring a child through Variety means the difference between learning and not.

Here’s the key part: “When schools return next month at least 240 children won’t have the basic requirements – a school uniform, shoes, a bag, lunch box, stationery, money to go on camp or do sports, field trips and exams. Their peers will be filled with excitement, collecting stationery, meeting new classmates and comparing their Christmas holidays. But the children whose parents cannot afford related school costs – that doesn’t include fees or donations – will either be missing from class altogether or likely dressed in a budget version of uniform with no sun hat, no shoes and no books to write in.”

As Variety chief executive Lorraine Taylor puts it, in New Zealand, “Education is free but access to it isn’t”. This “means children are turning up to school unequipped and feeling like the odd one out… For some, it means the beginning of their school year is delayed.”

The KidsCan charity is also experiencing record demand: “During 2018, KidsCan gave out 5.27 million items of food and clothed 47,350 children in warm jackets across New Zealand. In the past five years, the number of schools the charity supported have almost doubled, from 388 to 742” – see Jacques Steenkamp’s Hungry children won’t show up for new school year, principal says.

According to this article, some schools are being forced to innovate, taking on a role as social agencies. For example, one decile three Pakuranga primary school “has taken a novel approach to the hunger pains; slipping sandwiches and fruit surreptitiously into the schoolbags of students who aren’t able to bring their own.” In addition, “The school also sends food home with certain children in the evenings and on weekends, and help with uniforms and stationery costs.”

But should schools really be expected to play these social service roles in society? Auckland Primary Principals’ Association president Helen Varney raises the question of why the Government isn’t stepping up: “Is this what schools should be doing or should this be something our government should be looking at more closely and providing better services to the families in order to ensure children are coming to school everyday ready to learn?” – see RNZ’s Charity feeds thousands of school children each week.

Commenting on student poverty figures, Varney states: “I think it’s terribly sad. I think there’s something wrong with our society if that number is that high. It’s not acceptable at all but what we’re finding is that schools are having to create a range of initiatives so they meet the need of their community.”

She argues that “schools had become the social hub for communities”, but “providing meals for students each day meant that people were working on that rather than the providing education”. This can’t be avoided, she says: “We all know a child must be well fed, they must sleep well and eat well in order to be able to learn. So if they come to school hungry our first priority is to feed them.” However, “What surprises me now is how many are being supported and that’s a sad indictment on our society today”.

Not all commentators are impressed with such charity. Newstalk ZB talkback host Tim Dower agrees that something is wrong, and points out that “instead of this ambulance at the bottom of the cliff approach perhaps that’s where we should be directing our energy” – see: It’s great that KidsCan helps to feed schoolkids – but where are their parents? His approach is to point the finger at parents, with the answer being to show and help them “do the right thing by their children.”

Dower elaborates on the problem: “I can’t help asking where the hell the parents are in all this? And what message do we send when we step in and take over a job that truly is the responsibility of parents? And if we take that responsibility away from the parents are we giving them the idea they don’t need to feed their kids or put shoes on their feet? It’s OK: someone else will step in and do it. There’s been a lot of angry talkback about this and I really get where it’s coming from.”

Another community group, Money Talks, which is “a major financial and budgeting helpline” also says that this year has been particularly bad for families of school-age children in poverty – see 1News’ Kiwi parents feeling financial strain as students prepare to head back to school. The organisation “say they’ve had their busiest week ever as parents face up to the cost of getting their children ready for class.” This news report cites the case of one mother of four who is expecting to have to pay over $1000 to get them ready for school.

Another news report suggests that costs per child can be up to $900 – see Jamie Ensor’s Back to school costs limiting Kiwi kids’ future success – children’s charity. In this, Variety New Zealand’s Lorraine Taylor argues that “Many of the next generation of talented Kiwis won’t be successful due to the insurmountable costs associated with going back to school.” She also says “There are children that just don’t turn up to school on the first day because their parents don’t want to send them unless they have got the right uniform or the right equipment.”

A case study of a Northland primary and secondary school is provided by the Northern Advocate newspaper, examining the required purchases of stationery, uniforms, and digital devices – see: Back to school: Costs overwhelming for struggling families. This news item also reports on a school that has stopped asking for donations from families, but points out that the school’s offerings suffer as a result.

The escalating problem of back-to-school-poverty has brought about a major focus on the costs of uniforms, with allegations that prices are being “racked up” – see Katy Jones’ School uniform costs ‘horrendous’ in NZ, sparking call for government action. This article also reports that the Korowai charitable trust is calling on the Government to help fix the issue.

One simple fix has been proposed by More FM’s Gary McCormick, who says it’s time for the Ministry of Education to get rid of the blazers, and roll out one basic uniform across the country, albeit with different jerseys for different schools – see: Gary McCormick calls for national standardised uniforms for Kiwi kids.

For an in-depth examination of the production, distribution and pricing of school uniforms, it’s well worth reading Adele Redmond’s School uniforms – why do they cost so much?

According to Redmond, “The mark-up on school uniform items often exceeds 100 per cent after passing through importers, embellishers, and retailers. One importer, who supplies fabric to several large uniform companies, says he’s seen a kilt produced from his fabric sold at a 700 per cent mark-up.”

Finally, since virtually every other element of the education system is currently under review, perhaps it’s time to also move on from tradition and embrace diversity and change in terms of what kids wear to school – see the Dominion Post’s excellent editorial, Paying the cost of tradition: Is it time to ditch school uniforms?

By Dr Bryce Edwards

Equality, fairness, and cooperation look set to become the priorities underpinning the operations of the schooling system. They’re the values that are explicit in the radical new proposals to overhaul education and roll back the “neoliberal” Tomorrow’s Schools model that was imposed in the 1980s.The status quo, based on competition and a business model is deemed to have failed, creating inequality and poor outcomes. 

This column rounds up the arguments in favour of this view, and in support of implementing the recommendations of the Tomorrow’s Schools Independent Taskforce. It follows on from yesterday’s column – The Case against major school reform – which gave the other side of the story.

The case in favour of major school reform was put very strongly by Peter O’Connor in his column yesterday. He condemns the status quo as being all about producing winners and losers, and exacerbating the class system in New Zealand society – see: End of the Tomorrow’s Schools neoliberal experiment.

O’Connor is an educationalist at the University of Auckland, and a spokesperson for the Child Poverty Action Group. He welcomes the proposed new reforms as being a “very real philosophical shift”, which if implemented would amount to one of the biggest rollbacks of all the neoliberal market reforms of the 1980s.

He argues that the new recommendations say “schools must be involved in levelling the playing field rather than tilting it even further towards the rich and privileged. The task force recommendations puts social justice and the battle for the rights of the most marginalised at the heart of its proposed reforms.”

Rightwing and self-interested voices opposing the changes are simply an indication, according to O’Connor, that the reforms are worth implementing. He even embraces some of the rightwing critiques as being accurate: “David Seymour was right when he said the review was an attack on the autonomy of schools. The old fashioned 1980s idea that schools should be autonomous competing business units deserves to be dismantled”.

Another educationalist – and former Alliance MP – Liz Gordon has an equally negative evaluation of the Tomorrow’s Schools model, and views the latest proposals as “a wonderful breath of fresh air” – see: Yesterday’s schools.

She explains the origins of the reforms under David Lange: “Exactly 30 years ago, a taskforce headed by a supermarket magnate, and urged on by an ideological Treasury and rampantly privatising Labour Government, came up with a report on schooling that led to the Tomorrow’s Schools reports. These reforms, owing nothing to good educational practice and everything to Friedmanite economics, have done their best in the resulting period to destroy our society and environment.”

Gordon is particularly dismissive of the Board of Trustees model, labelling it “inherently flawed” and drawing attention to an OECD report that labelled them “self-perpetuating oligarchies”.

Peter Lyons, an economics teacher at Saint Peter’s College in Epsom, says the competitive model has created too many losers and not enough winners – see: Education reforms chance to bring back fairness to system.

Lyons explains how the status quo is based on rightwing market ideology, and has failed: “In the 1990s, New Zealand’s schooling system was dominated by a market-driven philosophy. Competition between schools would ensure greater efficiency and improved performance. Winner schools could even ‘take over’ loser schools just like in the real world of business.”

But he argues that it hasn’t worked in practice: “there are some tragic flaws in this ideology. There was never a level playing field to start with. Winner schools have far greater access to additional funding. This may be through international fee paying students, wealthy alumni, affluent fee paying parents or even black tie dinners that can raise an additional $100,000 in a single evening. Winner schools could then poach higher quality staff or top performing students and sports stars.”

Carol Anderson is another education practitioner with plenty of experience of different sides of the schooling system, and she provides a useful reading of the new proposals, focusing especially on what they would mean for the current boards of trustees – see: How the education reform proposals might affect schools, trustees and parents.

Anderson, who is a lawyer at Education Law NZ, explains the role of the boards, suggesting they currently have too much responsibility, which produces problems: “Since 1989 New Zealand school boards have had to deal with more extensive and demanding legal, educational and financial responsibilities than school boards in other education systems around the world. In practice, the extra administrative burden has fallen largely on the principal, detracting from their role as educational leader of the school. The Tomorrow’s Schools system currently provides widely varying quality of governance. The Task Force considers that it has led to serious educational inequality”.

Her very good article explains how the reduction in responsibilities of the boards is meant to help the schools. And she also provides many useful clarifications of what the proposals might mean. For example, she says: “a closer reading of the report shows that there is potential for more flexible arrangements. Contrary to the impression created in the media, the full report makes it clear that while the Hub will have overall legal responsibility, it will have the flexibility to delegate some of those responsibilities back to individual schools.”

Another informative overview of these issues is provided in John Gerritsen’s Taskforce suggests huge school reform. Interestingly, he also reports the responses of the President of the School Trustees Association, Lorraine Kerr, who believes “the plan to take responsibilities away from school trustees was not necessarily a bad thing in the view of trustees.” He quotes her saying, “For boards, all those things that distract them, the compliance, the accountabilities and even the employment issues will hopefully sit over here so that boards can think about why they were there in the first place and that was around helping to improve student achievement.”

A significant focus of the proposed reforms relates to school zoning. Previously, school zones were viewed as a barrier to student choice and to school performance. But the zoning rules may be boosted and better regulated under the new model – to ensure that students can attend their local schools, reducing the ability of the schools to pick and choose their students. The current rules have been labelled as “racist and unfair” by the taskforce.

As if to reiterate the current problems with zoning, John Gerritsen reported yesterday that “Schools are illegally refusing to enrol children by saying their classrooms are too full or insisting on permanent addresses for families in emergency housing. Attendance services and the legal help organisation YouthLaw said the problem was increasing, and one school was trying to insist that children live in its zone for a year before they could enrol” – see: Schools illegally refusing to enrol local children.

Furthermore, in the weekend, more allegations of competitive behaviour by the schools came out, with Katarina Williams reporting that the Minister of Education, Chris Hipkins believes there is a problem. He is quoted saying “We don’t want school principals’ remuneration, in the future, to be based on their ability to poach kids from other schools” – see: Education leaders concerned school heads boost student rolls to line their own pockets.

Hipkins also announced in the weekend that he wants to fast-track one of the taskforce’s recommendations – getting rid of decile system funding, to be replaced by an “Equity index” system – see Colin Williscroft and Jonathan Milne’s Census problems force ‘frustrated’ Minister to urgently overhaul school funding.

According to the taskforce, the current decile funding system is a blunt and inappropriate instrument, and it simply produces further disadvantage for many schools and communities. Hipkins acknowledges this, with the above article reporting his belief that the flash new buildings were going to the wealthy schools. Hipkins says: “One of the challenges around property that we’re grappling with is that most of the new property money goes into areas where there’s population growth, which tends to be the higher socio-economic areas…. At the moment I think the school system contributes to the growth in inequality”.

The decile funding system was already ear-marked to be replaced by the last National Government, but due to current problems with census data, Hipkins has ordered that the new system be brought in as early as two years’ time, instead of five years’ time.

Finally, the Chair of the taskforce making the recommendations is educationalist Bali Haque. And earlier in the year he wrote an illuminating opinion piece about how he saw the current schooling model. This piece provides, perhaps, the best – and most ideological – arguments for reform – see: Tomorrows Schools review must deal with the market’s failure.

By Dr Bryce Edwards

Debate has now kicked off over the Government’s most radical reforms to date – the overhaul of the way our schools are run. With the release of the “Tomorrow’s Schools Independent Taskforce” proposals for change, there is now a polarised and highly-ideological battle involving important values that will inform the future of education in this country. Today I’ll round up opposition so far to the proposed reforms and tomorrow’s column will look at the case in favour of the reforms.

I wrote about this ideological battle in a column on Wednesday, in which I outlined the clear left-right divide on how education should be organised – see: The sound of ideologies clashing. This points out that the status quo results from the fact that “David Lange’s 1988 Tomorrow’s Schools reforms saw traditional rightwing values of competition, choice, and performance win the day.”

In contrast, the Government’s new taskforce report is putting forward “a very leftwing proposal for reforming how New Zealand runs its school system, based on values of collectivism, cooperation, and equality.” In the end, therefore, even though there is “much less black and white than many on the left and right might suggest”, the likely success of failure of the new proposals to get public support will depend simply on “on whether the leftwing or rightwing values resonate more. It’s a simple left or right choice.”

The details of the proposed reforms are well covered by Simon Collins who draws attention to the polarised nature of the debate: “Battle lines are drawn over a proposed radical shake-up of the education system which has brought excited praise from liberals but condemnation as ‘Stalinist’ from more traditional schools” – see his news report, ‘Stalinist’ or ‘exciting’: Battle begins over radical school reforms.

Summing up the proposals, Collins says: “The taskforce would reverse key changes made in the last big reforms known as ‘Tomorrow’s Schools’ in 1989, when regional education boards were abolished and every school was given control of its operations budget and staff appointments.” Collins reports that conservative forces have tended to condemn the proposals, with more liberal institutions being supportive.

Another useful account of the details can be found in Derek Cheng’s Tomorrow’s Schools Review: All you need to know about the proposed education shake-up.

The most fervent critique of the proposals so far, comes from Matthew Hooton, who says: “No one should doubt the proposed radicalism” of the reforms, which are so extreme they go to show the new “regime has a further, much more sinister character” than was previously apparent – see: Education plan seeks far-left reform.

Hooton views the debate over the future of schooling as very much a left-right battle: “The main ideological divide in education is about comfort with difference. Perhaps surprisingly, the political right tends to be more encouraging than the left of innovation in schools.”

Hooton says that on the other hand, “the left’s main educational value is equality. That includes trying to help disadvantaged communities but it also requires tackling perceived privilege and achieving greater standardisation.”

According to Hooton, ironically it’s the current system that has produced a less entrenched private schooling system: “The only winners from last week’s education proposals will be private schools and children with parents able to afford them. Before David Lange’s Tomorrow’s Schools in 1989, private schools were in such demand that children were put on waiting lists the day they were born. Thirty years later, private school enrolments have fallen from 4.1 per cent of all students to just 3.4 per cent and they now resort to advertising. The reasons are complex, but one is Lange’s vision of freeing state schools to better reflect the values and priorities of their communities.”

Therefore, Hooton emphasises the benefits of devolution in the current model, which would be put at risk by the changes: “Sometimes this involves fairly trivial matters, like new school uniforms. More importantly, it has been about schools adopting different pedagogies and programmes that meet the needs of their particular communities and students, without first needing to apply to some centralised district board.”

Hooton also challenges the independence of the so-called “Independent” review, pointing out that its chair is also “the chairman of the New Plymouth Labour Party”. An Otago Daily Times editorial questions this too: “Parenthetically, it can be noted the ‘independent’ claim for the taskforce is – as is often the case with inquiries – hardly convincing. Taskforce chairman Bali Haque wrote a book criticising the secondary school system, and he has also been on the PPTA executive and president of the Secondary Principals’ Association.”

Although not against the proposals per se, the Otago Daily Times raises strong questions about them – see: ‘Stalinist’ or ‘exciting’ education change. The editorial makes it clear that the proposals are a big deal, and relate to a large ideological gulf: “Should the review’s recommendations be carried out, they would represent an upheaval of major magnitude, larger some say than even the radical changes from 1989’s Tomorrow’s Schools. Little wonder, then, that those supporting ‘parental choice’ and those wanting a ‘fairer’ system could be a long way apart.”

The editorial has a long list of questions which is worth listing at length: “Will schools and teachers be less inclined to strive for the very best in a less competitive environment? Will connections with communities be weakened and voluntary support lessened? Will parents and pupils have fewer choices and will the diversity of schools’ flavours be reduced? Will school boards become just advisory bodies without real power? Supposedly, they and principals would have more time and energy to concentrate on pupil achievement. But are not the likes of the appointment of the principal and even board nitty-gritty fundamental to pupil success? What about the bureaucracies created by the hubs? Why could not their roles and their advice be provided by a strengthened ministry? Could collaboration rather than competition be fostered in other ways?”

Some education sector groups and individuals have come out in opposition to the reforms. For example, RNZ reports that “Auckland Grammar headmaster Tim O’Connor says proposed reforms to the education system are a direct and serious attack on state education” – see: Headmaster slams radical proposals for schools.

O’Connor is reported as believing “the proposed changes would set education back 30 years. He said parents would be disempowered if functions of school boards were moved to education hubs”. He is quoted as saying too much power will be taken away from parents: “So they lose all governance responsibilities; they have nothing to do with school finances; they have nothing to do with school property…. Effectively what they [the taskforce] need to be honest about is they’re not a board of trustees; they’re an advisory group at best”.

Similarly, this news report says, “Briar Lipson from the think tank, the New Zealand Initiative, is concerned that reducing competition between schools will reduce incentives for them to lift their performance.”

Another elite school principal, Brent Lewis of Avondale College, is quoted by Simon Collins as labelling the proposals as “Stalinist” due to their apparent attempts to regain bureaucratic and centralised control – see: Big schools vow to resist ‘Stalinist’ school bureaucracy. He’s reported as believing that “schools needed to be nimble to respond to social and economic changes”, and that “bureaucracies are almost the antithesis of that”.

Lewis also believes the proposals will be deeply unpopular with parents: “If we apply this model, we will force large numbers of people to go to schools they don’t want to go to…. The political cost of that will be extremely high. You can do many things in New Zealand, but if you mess with people’s children and their life opportunities, then good luck to you”.

The same article reports that the Principals Federation is uncomfortable with the “proposal to rotate principals around schools with only five-year terms in each school”. And Act Party leader David Seymour is quoted opposing the reforms: “This is an intrusion on the autonomy of schools and will undermine communities’ ability to develop their own property by removing it and placing it in the hands of a remote bureaucracy”.

Similarly, National Party blogger David Farrar opposes the proposals on the basis that they would take away power and choice of families: “this is basically to force kids to attend their local school no matter how shitty or crappy it is. No more choice. You will go to the school the Government tells you to attend and like it. This will send house prices even higher in areas with desirable schools” – see: Govt taskforce proposes stripping school boards of all meaningful roles.

Coming from a different perspective, principal of Te Wharekura o Manurewa, Maahia Nathan, says the proposals “will not benefit Māori students in mainstream schools” – see Mānia Clarke’s Wharekura principal critical of education review.

Nathan says, “The core of the mainstream education system is still there. Nothing has really changed… the pieces on the board game have been moved around, but it’s still the same.”

Finally, the Government’s taskforce is now seeking feedback on the proposals – you can get more information on this and the report here: Tomorrow’s Schools Review.