Imagine this …. after the last round of BoT elections a school board was stacked with parents from a particular religious/ethnic/philosophical group. This group formed the voting majority of the BoT and held the firm belief that the school should no longer spend any time on the arts or PE. The strong focus of the programme should be on the ‘basics’ of literacy and numeracy, nothing else. No health education, no studying other cultures.
We would all support the school leadership in standing up for what is educationally and pedagogically defensible. The BoT may have the governance role and authority but they would be wrong in what they are saying. They are making decisions that we educationalists know would be detrimental to the interests of kids and their learning. The ethics of the BoT decisions enable the principal and his/her team to take and keep the moral high ground and even go out on a limb and say a resounding NO to what the have been instructed to do.
The BoT are crossing into what the Education Act says is the domain of the principal – the day-to-day operations of the school. Intruding on what is the professional domain, not the governance one. Making decisions the education professionals and NOT the enthusiastic amateurs should be making.
To me the national standards present us with the same scenario:
1. We KNOW from the experiences of other countries that national standards and league tables ultimately have a resounding, negative, long-term effect on the achievement in schools – NCLB in the US, England, etc.
2. This is a politically driven policy not an educationally derived one.
3. You don’t make a pig grow by measuring it! Learn about its needs, feeding it properly, giving it what it needs ….. and then the story is a different one.
4. We KNOW that the NS’s will hijack the good work and intent of the revised NZC. It is happening already. Just look at what we are talking and thinking about!
5. What is measured becomes important; even if it isn’t. The Standards focus on a very narrow range of skills in a narrow range of subjects. We have spent the last few years focusing on 21st century skills in programmes like ICT PD. Now we will be asked to report on an simplistic set that form only a small selection of the things we hope children will leave our schools mastering.
6. We have not been given the information or the where-with-all to do them justice anyway. We are yet to see the final Standards that we will all have to have in place and report against in 9 school weeks time. Over half of that time in our school is school camps, Pet Days, Athletics, aquatics, ICT PD days, etc so in reality we have 4 weeks or less to get to grips with the whole shebang. It’s simply not going to happen.
I am not at all big on compliance that makes no difference to student achievement or our ability to make things the best they can be for children. This week I have received the nice reminder letter about our 2008 Planning and Reporting. I’ll send it in now. We have always planned our development. Sending it to someone in the MoE doesn’t make it better or change in any way what I write. It is for our thinking and to share with our BoT how things are going.
At what point do we stand up for what we believe in? To say NO to what has no place in schools, what will make no positive difference, what will make the job harder? To challenge what we believe is not educationally defensible and say we want no part of it?
Where is that line in the sand? I believe we all need to be asking ourselves this question and then be prepared to live by the answer. The NZPF email today has the strongest statements I have seen for a long time encouraging us to really think about where we stand and what we believe as professionals.
Professionalism is the key issue …. professionals stand up for their professionalISM. It is important to them. Managers do what they are told, and make others do the same.
Leaders do what is RIGHT, even in the face of adversity. Not necessarily what is easy or popular; what is RIGHT. Principal development programmes have been telling us this for years when looking at dynamics, relationships and choices inside the school. Should the same not apply to things being imposed from outside?