Sunday, 23 September 2012

National Standards

So Fairfax has published the results of National Standards. Have they told us anything we did not know - namely that kids from poor areas don't do as well academically as kids from wealthier areas? Nope they haven't. The question is what are we going to do about it? I just hope that Paula Bennett doesn't decide that she will 'incentivise' beneficiaries to 'empower' their kids to do better, by cutting the benefit to the families of kids that under achieve. Nothing surprises me.
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2 comments:

  1. Mr C28 September 2012 at 01:41

    National Standards data has now been released. Also of interest is that there are 25 schools named as not supplying National Standards data to the Ministry – one being Waikanae Primary. However this is somewhat eroneous. The facts are that a) the BOT has had regular constructive ongoing dialogue with the MoE. B) The BoT has supplied assessment data to the Ministry – copious amounts of data! C) The National Standards data is already on the school website.
    One of the concerns about current National Standards data according to Hon John Key is that it is “ropey” due to lack of moderation, and of course there is also the issue of depth. Waikanae School supplied over 160 pages of assessment data, data that is both historical going back over several years,and comparative data that is current. It breaks the information down into the different cohurts, by age, class group, ethnicity, and gender. The school has reported to parents using the National Standards. The National Standards data is there, embeded in the other data to give an overall comprehensive view of how children are performing. It is also oposted on the school’s website for anyone to see. The problem appears to that the Ministry website can not handle the amount of assessment data provided. Instead the Ministry wants the data in a narrow, overly simplistic 2-3 page box ticking format.

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  2. Michael Bott30 September 2012 at 15:04

    Thanks for the comment. Box ticking leads to distortions as the form filler is forced to choose A,B or C and the actual answer can often be a mix.

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