National Standards have officially ended in primary schools across the country
The Government has officially ended the National Standards programme, meaning schools from next year will no longer have to report on them annually.
Labour has had a long-standing position to scrap National Standards and Education Minister Chris Hipkins says both schools and parents had lost confidence in them.
While schools will no longer report on National Standards they will still be able to use the assessment tool in the classroom to report child progress against the curriculum.
National Standards were always an attempt by National to infect public education with a neoliberal philosophy. National Standards were always a means to create league tables so that National could manufacture a fake competition model between schools.
This was never about the educational needs and simplification of explaining grades to parents, it was always about building the infrastructural data to allow league tables.
That this nonsense has been killed off is great, but Labour needs to do far more to genuinely re-invest in public education than just kill off stupid right wing experiments.
Ok, good riddance, but it is hardly a big achievement, as most parents want to know, what will replace national standards.
“National” standards replaced time spent teaching an learning. Its called Education.
Hopefully nothing will replace “National” standards as they are hardly a method of reporting to parents nor helping students and pupils learning.
Reporting to parent does not not require reference to any arbitrary standards as education and learning is different for all individuals. Most school programs have ongoing diagnostic assessment within and as a part of what is being taught.
Reporting to parents is about progress across a wide spectrum of school life and personal development.
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