Both Sides Archive

Using the poor to enhance the agenda of the wealthy and powerful has been a strong feature of political debate in New Zealand over 25 years now. Norman LaRocque does precisely this when he expresses strong support for the National Party's education policies.

With National's recent announcement of policies giving more freedom in education - choice for parents, self-management for schools, decreased bureaucracy - came, not surprisingly, a massed choir of largely self-interested criticism.

Our supposedly quality institutes are slowly becoming less and less sound. We as a country must demand a return to a full funded education system not only for the good of students but for the good of our entire society.

The release in January of the first ever NCEA results created huge public and professional interest. More than 60,000 students received the most detailed nationally-benchmarked profile of their performance that this country, or probably any other, has ever seen.

The Minister of Education appears to be pleased with the first NCEA results. At last, he says, students can see how they performed in each part of their subjects. If only it were true! A cursory glance at the summary statistics is enough to show how arbitrary and basically incredible the whole system is.