Dr Michael Johnston is a senior fellow at the policy think tank New Zealand Initiative. Photo: New Zealand Initiative
Most agree NZ's education is below par, but how to fix it is the subject of major conflict - as the government's proposed curriculum has made clear
When Michael Johnston stepped onto the stage to speak at an education conference last week, the crowd was tetchy and tense. He wasn't expecting a warm reception but for the first time in his long career in education, he was heckled and booed, according to one bystander.
Johnston is the lead educator for the think tank The New Zealand Initiative, and has played a key role in drawing up the government's controversial draft curriculum, while the audience at last week's UpliftEd event has largely been opposed to the overhaul.
He says he was invited to the conference several months ago by the organisers Aotearoa Educators Collective to speak about the state of boys' education, "a much-neglected equity gap".
"The reason I agreed to do it is I don't think there's enough talking across the aisles in education and I was very keen to try to bridge the gap.
"I'm not sure that worked but that was my intention," Johnston tells The Detail.
Newsroom's political editor Laura Walters was at the conference and says he was booed and heckled. Johnston says that's an exaggeration, and the audience was mixed in its response. He challenges suggestions that he represents a right wing think tank.
"I would say what we are is a classical liberal think tank. We give policy advice to any political party who wants to talk to us. You know, [Labour leader] Chris Hipkins spoke at our members' retreat earlier this year so it's not true that we only talk to the right wing parties."
The incident reflects deep divisions in the sector over the contentious curriculum, labelled by critics as racist, deeply concerning, absolutely ridiculous and more.
In the latest development, the government's decided to cut the requirement of school boards to give effect to the Treaty of Waitangi, a move that has shocked and angered some in the sector who say it will put Māori content in danger and undermine efforts to lift Māori students' achievement.
Other areas of contention cross from arts to technology to Physical Education.
The full draft for Years 0 to 10 has been released in the last week and is open for consultation for the next six months, before a phased rollout over the next three years.
"To call it an education reform or overhaul wouldn't be overstating it," says Newsroom's Walters. "What the government is asking teachers and principals and educators to do is pretty massive and educators don't feel like they're being listened to."
She points to a loss of goodwill over the past two years between the government and the ministry on one side, and teachers and educators on the other.
"I can understand and I wasn't surprised by that immediate and broad pushback from the sector that feel like they're being asked to rush through these massive reforms at pace, that they're not getting the support that they need; that they're not being listened to.
"Meanwhile, they're dealing with the day-to-day, these classrooms with children who have high learning needs, high behavioural needs. You kind of have to put the pushback or the reaction into that context."
Johnston says the criticism is loud but it is not widespread or a balanced reflection of the sector.
"I suspect it isn't a majority of teachers and principals but certainly there's a lot of noise generated by some.
"I've talked to a lot of principals myself, I've been around the country in the last weeks and months and had a lot of conversations. A lot of principals are very supportive and certainly think things like this are urgently needed," he says.
He believes there are legitimate concerns about the pace of change and the extent to which teachers will have to shift their practise.
"They're going to need support to do that, so I understand that side of the worry. It needs to be backed with the right resources."
For the past 18 months Johnston has been part of the curriculum coherence group, a panel convened by the Ministry of Education to review the rewrite.
"We look at the documents that the writers produce and comment on them from the point of view of knowledge-rich curriculum design, mostly."
He explains the often-used phrase "knowledge-rich" means the content is carefully selected to be representative of a subject and that it is correctly sequenced.
"It's knowledge that is related to other knowledge, so that when children learn it ... it is built on what they already know."
Walters says a lot has been dumped on the sector and teachers and principals need time to digest the details.
"I think that there will be more nuance and more context and a better understanding that will flow through over the next couple of weeks. It's really unclear as to whether they will actually change their stance."
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