Teachers balk at league table approach to schools

Educators fear proposed literacy and numeracy standards will create a "winner and loser" mentality in school communities.

As consultation for the draft national standards for primary and intermediate schools continues with families, teachers, principals and school trustees, principals fear schools' performances will be compared in league tables.

The new standards mean parents will be able to assess their children's progress against national academic standards.

"It is good to have the standards released so we can see something in the flesh, but I don't want to see schools being compared," Principals' Federation president Ernie Buutveld said.

"If school A has 25 per cent of students meeting the standard and school B has 75 per cent, I know which school parents would choose to send their children to. Suddenly school A has a falling roll and has to close. A narrow piece of criteria is being used to make a decision about a school. It could create a winner and loser outlook, which would be wrong."

Island Bay School principal Perry Rush had "no doubt" schools' performances would be compared. "Comparisons are absolutely inappropriate. Some schools would be seen to be less effective when that may not be the case."

The primary teachers' union, the Educational Institute, said any move to make school assessment information available for league tables would be "destructive".

"League tables take the focus off the learning needs of children ... and put the emphasis on school ranking, solely on literacy and numeracy results," president Frances Nelson said.

Education Minister Anne Tolley said she would not be using schools' information to compare performances. "As far as I am concerned, we are not planning to publish any form of information that could be used for league tables."

But she said it would be acceptable for some parents to dole out blame if their children's performance was not up to scratch. "There's a variety of reasons why that might happen, especially if a teacher isn't using a good assessment technique in their teaching when the national standards are in place ... We encourage parents to get involved in a child's education."

She said the standards would set a clear expectation for children's education. "There have been a number of different standards that schools have been operating with and this puts it all into one basket."

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