Wow, Charter Schools! The ACT ideologues have won out. Here’s the coalition agreement:
The provision to set up a trial charter school system – under sections 155 (Kura Kaupapa Maori) and 156 (designated character schools) of the Education Act – for disadvantaged communities, specifically in areas such as South Auckland and parts of Christchurch where educational underachievement is most entrenched. A private sector-chaired implementation group will be established to develop the proposal for implementation in this parliamentary term.
Last winter in Chicago, a meeting of the school board (which oversees the Chicago Public Schools and the budget of the city for education) almost melted the snow: hundreds of charter schools supporters gathered at the meeting in yellow scarves and chanting; opponents of “privatisation” of public schools stormed the meeting. The school board maintained its course – establishing new charter schools and closing “failing” public school ones.
Charter schools in the US have the freedom to organize around a core mission, curriculum, theme, or teaching method. They are allowed to control their own budgets and hire (and fire) teachers and staff. You would wonder why this is controversial. Guess what? New Zealand schools already have these kinds of freedoms.
In Massachusetts, in return for this “freedom”, a charter school must prove good results within a certain period or – poof! – charter gone. This is high stakes performance, because it is profits that are lost.
Back here, we have Tomorrow’s Schools, and all have a “charter” with the Crown in return for public funding. The New Zealand reforms of 1989 were supposed to fix the problems of South Auckland, too. They’re only now addressing them.
Will John Banks’ charter schools fix them? It seems unlikely. An independent report for the Chicago School Board released only last week showed that their charter schools have been shown to be better, indifferent, and sometimes worse than the Chicago Public Schools they are supposed to show up – as measured by test scores.
I’m trying to imagine what “charter schools” could mean for South Auckland. Could it mean that Maori will get more kura or more kotahitanga? Could it mean that Pacific families could choose a high-quality bilingual learning option? I’m sure that this is not ACT’s purpose.
Could it mean that some South Auckland schools close and re-open as “charter schools” – with a new principal, teachers, and support staff? I’m not sure what this would fix for the kids; but it’ll sure be an issue for the teachers; and that won’t be helpful to student achievement.
Which schools would close? Could it mean that South Auckland students can bus across town to a charter school out East? Doesn’t some of that happen now?
Whatever it means, the PM’s agenda for education has shifted; whether by accident or design is unclear. Charter schools will replace National Standards as the defining outcome in education for the government’s next term. National Standards will have new meaning; no longer “information for parents”, but a measure of school performance. The National party’s profile on National Standards will disappear in the thunder and bedlam of ACT’s lead in charter school development. Pity the real Minister of Education. Whoever it is, she or he may not get a word in edgeways.
Under-achievement in South Auckland is New Zealand’s future economic disaster. Worse, its perpetuation by more point-scoring from Wellington will undermine the determination of the supercity to address more cohesively the social contexts for educational success. Poverty matters. Charter schools don’t change that.
