National's Standards

It appears crystal clear to me that National Standards are not the way forward for New Zealand schools. The publicity and discussion surrounding them is wholey negative, and I am yet to read any positive comments surrounding them.

It worried me greatly then when I read in an article stating that the Government are determined to push them through regardless of the feedback they are receiving. Anne Tolley has been quoted as saying:

"The Government will not resile from national standards. Parents want them, they have a right to them and this government is going to deliver them."

I have a couple of problems with this comment.

1. The Government obviously intends to implement the standards, given that they "will not resile". Then why did they spend thousands of dollars holding public consultations? Have the people attending these sessions being wasting their time and energy?

2. How do they know that the National Standards are in a form that parents want? How many parents attended the public consultations? Was this figure sufficient as to suitably represent the New Zealand public? I did some statistics at University - hit me with the numbers, Anne.

3. I do not want to belittle New Zealand parents or imply that they are stupid (I am one myself), but just because they want National Standards (assuming that this is true), does that mean they should have them? We in the education sector are trained professionals. Why does our collective judgement seem to carry so little weight?

A point that annoys me a lot, amoung others, is that these Standards will be able to be used to compare and, in effect, assess schools. I'm sure that the people from ERO came to visit our school last year to make sure we were doing a good job. It turns out we were doing a great job. Why do we, who have been given our seal of approval (as most schools have) need to be further checked? I almost feel like the government does not trust the judgement of teachers (for ERO officers are teachers too) to evaluate their own.

When I first started teaching, I was surprised by the mistrust that teachers afforded the Ministry. I'm sorry to say I share this mistrust, as I do not feel trusted, respected, or my work valued.