The Wheel of Corruption Just keeps On Rolling

Recently Massey University Professor John O’Neill published an article, about three of the new charter schools, on the Aotearoa Educators Collective substack. 

The charter school clown car tootles on in ever reducing circles

John, whom I’ve known for nearly two decades, was a member of the taskforce, led by Bali Haque, to enquire into the operation of Tomorrows Schools. Sadly this went nowhere due to the resistance of organisations with vested interests such as the NZ School Trustees Association, and the wealthy ‘prestigious’ Auckland Schools, and also due to the seeming inability of the last Labour government to make major decisions.  When I last spoke to him he was reconciled to the fact that nothing had resulted from the hard work the task force had put in. 

Note that since John wrote this article, Seymour has announced the new sport focussed charter school, so he doesn’t discuss that. 

“Playing circus ringmaster while he can, Associate Minister of Education Seymour’s announcement that three allegedly innovative new charter schools will open in Term 1 2026 gleefully hurls another custard pie in the face of our chronically under resourced, long-suffering, state schooling system.”

How’s that for an opening statement? John continues to discuss these three new charter schools, revealing more about who is behind them.

He points out that Seymour’s first model of charter schools, back in the days of the Key led governments, focussed on equity principles, aiming to improve educational opportunities for children living in areas of inequality and hardship. 

Yes, I know, since when has Seymour been concerned with the ‘dropkicks (his word) of society? Obviously he couldn’t wring any more publicity out of that approach so this time he’s tried another tack.

“Whereas this time round, under unashamedly libertarian free choice principles it appears that literally anything goes as far as the Charter School Authorisation Board clown car is concerned. Effectively, we are witnessing a self-absorbed Kiwi bourgeoisie reenacting the Middle Ages carnival, the ‘time of fools’, turning even further upside down our tradition of local neighbourhood schooling for all just for the fun of it.”

The first of these new charter schools is a recycled version of the old model.

“Te Aratika High School originally opened in 2017 as a partnership school or kura hourua in our charter school 1.0 period (2012-2018). It was approved to become a state integrated school when the incoming centre left government abolished charter schools in 2018. It is now being recycled and converted to operate under charter school 2.0 rules from next year.”

Paradoxically, given Seymour’s relentless attacks on anything to do with Māori and Pasifika issues, his goals for this school are: 

“Mr Seymour conjures something of a Native Schools retro vibe in his caricature of the school’s purpose: to prepare disengaged Māori and Pacific students for vocational employment.” 

Before you start to think that maybe Seymour has a good side after all, note the aim is to prepare these students for vocational employment.  

In other words, educate them to be good, obedient workers rather than aiming to educate them to develop their full potential.  Recall my previous articles about the right wing view of education being to create workers  for the capitalist system? 

However the school has other ideas:

The kura itself, in contrast, envisages far more expansively aspirational curriculum and pathway options for its taiohi:

• To meet the unique cultural, academic, physical, social and emotional needs of Māori/Pasifika youth

• To partner collaboratively with iwi, hapū, industry partners, schools and tertiary institutions

• To provide innovative learning experiences for foundation education; and vocational pathways with a primary focus on infrastructure works and employment opportunities.

If this school achieves all this for its students, then that will be very positive, regardless of its charter school status.

As John writes:

“Given the current government’s hostile attitude toward anything to do with Te Tiriti o Waitangi, is it really any wonder that tangata whenua organisations such as this see charter schooling as the best option to uphold their values and the promises of Te Tiriti and He Whakapuanga, namely outside the state schooling system? It’s a win for our people of the land, not for the Act party.”

However it is the other two charter schools that are cause for concern.

“The other two new charter schools offer limited or no prospects for genuine innovation, but have everything to do with privatising public funding that, morally, should be invested in improving our democratically governed state schools”.

Given the previous discussions about Elizabeth Rata’s 19th century view of education, the first one is rather interesting,

“Altum Academy in Wellington will offer a classical education based on Plato and the medieval university trivium, the first three of the seven liberal arts (the sort of curriculum that was designed for the sons of gentlemen, not the masses)”

This alone is enough to raise eyebrows; however when we look at it in light of what we know about the ideology behind this government’s education agenda, then it is not surprising. 

Contrast the programme of this school, and its target student body, with the aims Seymour outlined for the first school, of providing vocational education to Māori and Pasifika students. How more blatant can the racism be?

But that’s not all, when we look at who is involved in this charter school, we find:

“Altum Academic Charitable Trust was registered with Charities Services only as recently as July 2025. Its officers include Michael Johnston as Trust Board Chair (Is this the same Michael Johnston of New Zealand Initiative and MAG fame? The cognitivist Richelieu to our wannabe Sun Queen?) and Jonathan Ayling as trustee (Presumably the same Ayling who is Chief Executive of the NZ Free Speech Union and former advisor to two National party MPs)

Brie Elliot has also picked up on this and goes into the makeup of the governing board in more detail in this Facebook video. Her first point is that the people running this board may have a direct connection to the board that approves charter schools. Corrupt?

New Charter School Approval Raises Red Flags.

For those of you who don’t have access to Facebook, she has also provided a synopsis of her video. However watch the video if you can as there’s more than covered in the synopsis.

“A new charter school is opening under the Altum Academic Charitable Trust – but who’s behind it, and how was it approved?

The trust includes public figures like Jonathan Ayling (Free Speech Union) and Helen Walls / The Writing Teacher, while Michael Johnston chairs the trust. There are network overlaps between some trustees and the Charter Schools Authorisation Board, which approves new schools.

We don’t yet know if Michael Johnston is the same Michael Johnston linked to the NZ Initiative, a policy think tank connected to global networks influencing charter schools.

The public deserves clarity, transparency, and accountability.

Questions raised:

• Is the Chair of the trust connected to the NZ Initiative?

• How do the trustee and board networks overlap?

• Was the approval process fully independent?”

For a start, we know that the Free Speech Union is linked to the Atlas Network, so what’s the agenda here?

And if the Michael Johnston mentioned is indeed the Dr Michael Johnston of the New Zealand Initiative, which seems probable to me, then remember he was a member of Stanford’s Ministerial Advisory Group.

And that’s not all. The Charter School Authorisation Board, which approves new charter school, has amongst its members Neil Paviour-Smith. Catherine Isaac, and Elizabeth Rata – all connected to the New Zealand Initiative.

As Brie says, this is raising serious questions about governance and transparency.

Helen Walls as a literacy advocate has direct involvement with private literacy providers – conflict of interest?

And so the wheel of corruption keeps turning.

Back to John’s article:

“The Altum Academic Trust has been established to support the development of academic excellence for students via a knowledge rich, prescribed, explicitly taught curriculum. The trust also seeks to elevate and grow good character within a supportive and nurturing environment based on traditional Christian values and principles.”

There’s the agenda, again in plain sight.

The third charter school is also another eyebrow raiser…

“The third new school, Aotearoa Infinite Academy (it must be OK, it has the word Aotearoa in its title!), is to all intents and purposes a publicly funded mini-me offshoot of the private, for-profit overseas and domestic capital boosted Crimson Global Academy NZ (yes, the one with Sir John Key and former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on the Advisory Board).”

The dubious nature of Crimson Academy has been well established, yet here we are shovelling tax payer money to it, not that they need it

“The Academy’s parent company is Crimson Global, headed by Jamie Beaton, King’s College alumnus who was a protégé of American hedge fund billionaire, and vocal supporter and funder of privatised schooling initiatives, including Teach First NZ, Sir Julian Robertson. Crimson Global was valued at NZD 1billion at the end of last year. (Again, certainly not one for the masses.)”

This whole set up smells and is yet more proof that the true agenda of this government’s education agenda is being kept from us, and is far worse than is apparent.

John concludes:

“Why, then would we need to give away precious funds to outfits that at the end of the day are only in it for the profit they can extract and export?

One likely answer? Look no further than a circus ringmaster, custard pies, clown cars, a convenient alliance of neo-conservative and neo-classical liberal chancers, and a once in several generations opportunity to break up our state schooling commons.”

So there you have it.

Have you got the message yet?

Note: 

Since Brie published her video she has received correspondence from Helen Wall:

“Earlier today, I posted about the connections between the new charter school (Altum Academic Trust) and figures like Helen Walls, Jonathan Ayling, and Michael Johnston – raising questions about transparency and conflicts of interest.

At the time of posting, Helen Walls was listed as a current trustee on the Charities Register.

Helen publicly replied to me, confirming she was still on the trust when the school was approved, but claimed to have since stepped down.

However, the register still listed her as active – until JUST NOW.

Now – since that post gained attention – the Charities Register has been updated today (23 October) to show she resigned yesterday (22 October) and has been moved to past trustees.

So to be clear:

She was a trustee during the school’s approval process.

The public record showed her as active this morning.

The register was only updated after questions were raised – recording her resignation as of yesterday.

That’s not speculation – that’s a documented sequence of events.

And if trustees step down right after public scrutiny, it raises real questions about transparency and governance. 

She publicly called me a “conspiracy theorist” for even asking questions. It’s not a conspiracy if it’s true, Helen. It’s called accountability.

Christopher Luxon???? What is going on????”