Erica Stanford’s abdication of responsibility
It has become apparent over the past week that Erica Stanford is starting to feel the heat over her education agenda, going by her snappy reply to a TVNZ reporter asking about the attitude of the Principals Federation, and her responses in Parliament Question Time when challenged.
It doesn’t help that she is now starting to fudge answers, either by omission, or by being ‘economical with the truth”. This is not a sign of a minister on top of her portfolio.
Her performance this week in Question Time was an example, picked up by Bevan Holloway, and which he outlines in this article.
Phonics Data and Te Tiriti: Stanford’s Abdication of Responsibility
“In response to questions put to her by Debbie Ngarewa Packer in the House on Thursday 6 November about the removal of Te Tiriti o Waitangi from Section 127 of the Education and Training Act, Erica Stanford made the following assertions:
A process undertaken by Minister Goldsmith with regard to the Treaty Principles Bill came back with a conclusion that it was questionable for school boards to be delegated a core Crown duty — ie, to uphold their obligations under Te Tiriti.
She took very seriously her requirement to uphold her core Crown duty to abide by the principles of the Treaty, and said “the core tenant of that is to raise Māori achievement”.
Her Government has raised Māori achievement like no other, as proved by the early phonics data.
I will deal with these assertions one by one.”
Bevan has a very good understanding of these issues, and explains them well.
“The Delegation of Duty
School boards are Crown entities, and so carry the authority of the Crown. The Waitangi Tribunal has found that there can be no delegation of authority without responsibility. Stanford is claiming here that she is giving boards the authority to enact government policy, but relieving them of their responsibility to uphold their obligations under Te Tiriti. This is a position at odds with The Waitangi Tribunal.
In effect, Stanford is telling boards, Don’t worry about the Treaty — we’ve got it covered. Just do what we order and you will too.”
Whether she, and her colleagues like it or not, obligations to the Treaty can’t be set aside by the whim of a minister or indeed the government as a whole.
Bevan then discusses this.
“The Crown’s Duties in Education
Let’s assume her position is valid: the Government can assume total responsibility for board Treaty obligations. What does that mean we could expect to see happening?
At the very least, there would be active, intentional Māori involvement in the development of the education system’s policies and settings, including curriculum, aims and objectives. This has not happened. In the same exchange, Ngarewa Packer asked Stanford which Māori had been consulted, listened to or who supported her decision to remove Te Tiriti. Stanford did not answer that question, aside from pointing to the Māori members of Cabinet.
So what we appear to have is one party to Te Tiriti, the Crown, making a unilateral decision regarding what upholding its obligations looks like in education.”
Are you surprised? This lack of consultation is the usual modus operandi of this government. The ignoring of Māori perspectives is also, sadly, a common feature, in their ongoing efforts to ‘recolonise’ the country.
This continual incremental chipping way at Treaty obligations is colloquially known as ‘salami slicing’, slicing off a little bit at a time so it’s less noticeable, until suddenly the effect of adding up all the slices becomes significant. Another year of this doesn’t bear thinking about.
Bevan then continues to analyse the second leg of her statement, that she has raised Māori achievement. There’s something ‘Trumpian’ about her grandiose claims.
“Phonics as Evidence
But let’s assume Stanford has it right, and all Māori want from the education system is academic achievement for their tamariki. Stanford claimed success in turning the tide of Māori underachievement by pointing to the early phonics data recently released. However, this data has been convincingly critiqued as substandard.”
I will paste the next section in full as it makes for very interesting, informative, and eyebrow raising reading.
“We must also question whether this phonics data, which Stanford is rhetorically tying tightly to her implementation of a knowledge-rich curriculum grounded in the science of learning, is an indicator of the kind of academic achievement parents want. Her move away from whole- and balanced-literacy instruction to structured literacy instruction with its heavy reliance on phonics gives us an easy way to make a comparison.
For example, in 2010, a time when National Standards were being brought in, “On track” meant after one year at school, students
-
- will read, respond to, and think critically about fiction and non-fiction texts at the green level of Ready to Read, and
-
- they will use their writing to think about, record, and communicate experiences, ideas, and information to meet specific learning purposes across the curriculum.
These are complex literacy skills. In comparison, Stanford’s data comes from a phonics check that requires students to get 24 out of 40 ‘reading’ something like the following:
‘On track’ means…. 24 out of 40 on this word test (the Phonics Check)
1 ag
2 ut
4 net
5 mig
6 lep
7 com
8 pon
9 gam
10 rod
11 yax
12 quop
13 back
14 long
15 chin
16 thop
17 shum
18 tull
19 trip
20 wink
21 frem
22 clend
23 print
24 spran
25 wheel
26 doom
27 flain
28 sloam
29 feast
30 fabric
31 made
32 zale
33 stroke
34 stribe
35 short
36 harn
37 blork
38 join
39 high
40 pumpkin
58% percent of students in the data she refers to passed that check. Schools that reached that percentage in previous years were seen as not performing.
School boards, Stanford wants you to believe that she has you covered, and you ensuring this happens in your school is you upholding your obligations to Te Tiriti.
(Oh, don’t forget to sprinkle a few Māori words around now and then. But not in maths, please).”
Yes, you’ve read that correctly. This is the evidence that Stanford has presented that ‘proves’ her changes have made a difference to reading achievement. See what I mean by ‘Trumpian’ levels of hubris?
Bevan’s concluding statement is a gem.
“Stanford often proudly claims to have turned the tide in education, and she is right. It’s a king tide, racing in and hammering the shore, reducing our kids’ opportunities to roam and discover and think and connect.”
It’s all arrant nonsense. If it wasn’t for the fact that our children are going to bear the brunt of all this, we could laugh it off, as we do with many of Trump’s nonsensical claims.
Sadly we can’t.
Removing this government in 12 months is the best we can to protect TeTiriti and the education of our children.
Note:
The official Hansard record of this is available here, in two links due to technical issues.
Question No. 5 (continued)—Education
However, she has awarded herself 7 out of 10 in performance, so all is well. Will the pupils now be allowed to self-test in an unbiased way?
The phonics list looks good, if you want the kids learning some kind of orcish dialect.
This is what teachers think of her performance Erica Stanford – End of Year Report Card https://aecnz.substack.com/p/erica-stanford-end-of-year-report?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=2677630&post_id=178248718&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=2o2sw&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
At last a someone in any government of the last 15 years doing something for the children. The boards still teach what they decide on but are not forced to comply with treaty obligations. If parents request Maori be taught the school will do so. I really hope that people wake up and look at other countries like Indonesia who now has a lost generation of students forced to learn and speak Indonesian first with no consideration for international languages used for business or trade. Go Standford for children.
Is it an Abdication of Responsibility or a Dereliction of Duty to All NZers???
Because it all looks like she is more interested in keeping the Corporations eg the Atlas Network happy rather than being an actual Elected Representative of the Voting NZers even those in her electorate.
She may hold Breaking News Press Conferences Galore but in reality she lacks Credence and Credibility.
Some may want her to usurp Luxon but I think she is as bad as him. That is a completely Out of Touch with Reality Attention Seeking Incompetent Loser. She is just there for probably the Eye Candy as she is useless even to keeping Seymour in control.
And in regards to Power Hungry Insane and Mad David Seymour. He has proven to be the Tail that Wags the Dog in this weird Marriage of Convenience that is this coalition government. He has too much control and even Stanford is too weak to stand up to him.
I need to add but look at Luxon’s eyes in the above photo. He is looking Dead from the Head Down in regards to whatever HIS government(which includes ACT and NZ First)does to this country.
He is after all onto a good thing i.e Taxpayer funded accommodation, meals at Bellamys, overseas travel, hotel, Transport by limo, meals at Michelin star restaurants rather than going to work at McDonalds for a Pre-election Photo Opportunity, Pavlova Photo Opportunities up a mountain . You name it and Luxon has probably Not Paid a Cent Out of HIS OWN POCKET for what he deems himself Entitled to.
And so whilst he pretends to care I doubt if ever he would. Will we again see him and family in matching Silk Peejays in yet another Pavlova Moment Photo Opportunity???!!!! We shouldn’t put anything past Luxon because after all Luxon is ALL ABOUT LUXON.
what the eff is this? half of those syllables/words or phonetic sounds don’t exist in English. thank fuck my kids completed their schooling years ago.
Half of those ‘words’ aren’t words. What’s the point of that? There must be better examples which are real words.
OK, so they can pronounce those ‘words’ but obviously comprehending the words doesn’t matter?
Reading and Comprehension is what children need to learn, Erica. Your phonics is only half the picture, less than that.
Also, if they are required to pronounce non-words, what’s so devastatingly dreadful about a few Māori words? They are a great deal more relevant than non-words.
I would NEVER waste children’s time expecting them to learn non-words which are of no use to them at all.
That’s just stupid and if she thinks that proves she’s improving literacy she’s a bigger fool than I thought.
Complete amateur, like the rest of them. Another deluded Spin-ister, Spin-ister or Education.
We can make up non-words too, Erica. You’re pathetic!
Paul, Stanford doesn’t stand for children. She stands for her foreign donors and masters who want unthinking factory fodder. She is wasting our time.
Another in the growing list of really shit ministers in this government .Before the election I was concerned for our brown ,female ,workers populations ,never in my wildest dreams did I see the women in government would attack our children with such ferver .We are witnessing our own form of genercide ,where we will have all kids living in poverty .We now see homeless ,hungry ,and now education deprived kids as our future and these so called mothers that are the ministers leading the charge are glee full about what they are doing every day .
gordon your atrocious spelling and grammar rule out any comments you make on issues of education.
If you’re going to throw stones Bob at least use correct capitalisation!
Where?
Save your criticism for ‘Im right’ Bob the knob ,,,,,, that idiot can’t even write down ‘ I’m ‘ correctly….
…. and I never criticise spelling, as that is a petty little knobs activity ,,, but a two letter word like I’m, and from a person who pretends they are correct on everything…. talk about stupid :0
If you are referring to gordon without a capital G you are incorrect, gordon himself doesn’t use a capital G.
I’ll put Martin LeFevre in at the bottom here – shame if the post ended up with a sting in its tail from some of the pathetics that come here, full of self-importance and something else of not much substance apart from their fatheads. But enough time spent for no worthwhile reason so here is something that will be interesting, LeFevre’s always are.
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2511/S00022/education-involves-two-kinds-of-learning.htm
…The disaster of modern education extends beyond America of course. An education writer in Britain bluntly defined schooling in the UK as “a curriculum that is overly academic and culturally barren, with teachers treated as robots.”
Better robots than propagandists, as the Trump Administration is hell-bent on installing from elementary school through university. Then again, most American teachers have always been propagandists for “the American way of life,” the core values of which have been materialism, capitalism and consumerism….
…But with AI, for better, and so far for worse becoming the repository of human knowledge, humankind’s basic relationship to knowledge itself has to change.
Yes, “children “crave a knowledge of the real world,” and need “to be given a knowledge of money, law and legal rights, politics and voting, and skill at finding a job.”
However, to use that or any other knowledge wisely, and navigate and transform a corrupt and corrosive global society (not to mention being masters rather than slaves to AI), parents and teachers have to be able to transcend knowledge, and gain insight and liberation from their own conditioning.
Attentive self-knowing is something that can only be taught by example. Sadly, whether in the home or in the schools, few parents or teachers understand its supreme importance.
The planet is on fire and the world is in chaos. And the online world has bled into the ‘real world’ to the point of a distinction without a difference.
Never before in human history has there been a greater urgency in adults for a practical, applied understanding in the education of children of the difference between the cumulative learning of knowledge, and the non-accumulative learning of attention and insight.