Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Our kids' education is too important to muck around

You can't accuse Erica Stanford of mucking around, can you?

NCEA is gone. Marks out of 100 are back, grades from A to E are back, needing to pass 4 subjects at least in order to get the qualification is back.

Now, how long have we been talking about the need to do this? About the fact that NCEA is rubbish, that it's been gamed, that it's not respected by employers, that it's not understood by parents? How long have we talked about this? 

And then within 18 months of Erica Stanford taking over the education portfolio, the changes are made.

 This is absolutely, by the way, the right thing to do. Nowhere, in none of the assessments of what's happening at NCEA Level 1, 2 or 3, do you hear anyone say - hey, you know what, this is a good system. It's always criticism.

The ERA had a look at NCEA Level 1 last year and they found such big problems with that they recommended getting rid of it.

NZQA last year found only half of year 12 students actually finished 3 full subjects. They didn't even get to do 3 full subjects, but they somehow managed to pass NCEA.

NZCER found that learning was not the focus of school at NCEA level anymore, assessment was.

The OECD two years ago found what we always know is going on lately and our ability to read, write and do maths was slipping. It had now fallen below the OECD average.

The NZQA Insights paper found a huge number of kids got Level 3 because it's easy, but UE, the old equivalent, they couldn't get it because it's not easy. 

Now, none of this is news to us, right? Some of these reports actually date back to 2018, 7 years ago. Yet NCEA hasn't been scrapped until now.

Now, this is brave, because any change this big is brave, but especially, it's brave right now at a time when secondary school teachers are already dealing with a lot.

They have a curriculum refresh on the go. They've got new compulsory exams already now, they've got this. They are busy and they're about to get busier.

And while I feel for them, and I do, our kids are too important and their education is too important to muck around.

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