Board sacking unrelated to ex-principal's court action, says Mallard

1.00pm

Education Minister Trevor Mallard said today the sacking of the troubled Cambridge High School's board of trustees yesterday has nothing to do with its former principal going to court today to try and get her job back.

Last month the principal Alison Annan resigned amid controversy over a damning New Zealand Qualifications Authority report over National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) credits for students.

Mr Mallard announced yesterday he was dissolving the board and appointing a commissioner following an Education Review Office (ERO) special review.

The decision had nothing to do with Mrs Annan's decision to go to the Employment Relations Authority in Auckland this morning to get her job back.

"No this doesn't make any difference to that situation. Mr Finn (Dennis Finn, one of two statutory managers appointed when Mrs Annan resigned) has been the limited statutory manager in charge of employment so the relationship...would have been with Mr Finn either as limited statutory manager or as the commissioner," he told National Radio today.

"There's not been a relationship with the board since over a month ago."

Mr Mallard said the board accepted the full version of the negative ERO report but today former board chairwoman, Diana Grantham, said the findings were a surprise considering the previous report was positive.

"My first reaction was how can the report have changed so much from the 2003 report when they reported at the end that we were now back to our normal cycle to the one (the report) now, which is just amazing," she told National Radio.

Ms Grantham said she was "a little stunned" by the report.

"I think we have been kept in the dark, I don't think they have been entirely honest with us."

She said the board had done its best and had not been controlled by Mrs Annan.

"Perhaps we were very naive in what we were doing but at the bottom line I suppose we were all doing it from the goodness of our heart... working for the school ensuring the kids and the teachers got what they wanted. But obviously we didn't do it well enough."

Mr Mallard said the report found many problems. "For me there were some really important ones around the safety of staff, the ability of staff to be able to come to the board to feel that they working in a good working environment," he told National Radio.

He said some of the issues were not new and were backed up by previous ERO reports.

Sacked board member Craig Stevenson said today he was "really disappointed with the whole thing".

"I don't believe we have been told the whole truth. We have had glowing reports from ERO and in 12 months it has all changed."

Mr Stevenson said the board had been led to believe everything was running smoothly.

"Obviously a lot of staff were upset but we didn't know about a number of these allegations.

"At the end of last year the heads of faculties gave a glowing report but we have since discovered there was a climate of fear. It's disappointing they felt they couldn't tell us."

Mr Stevenson said board members had been caught in the middle and weren't provided with all the information they needed to do the job.

"The information flow stopped for whatever reason and we were almost blindfolded. We didn't know what was going on."

Mr Stevenson advised people volunteering to become school board members to think very seriously about the consequences.

ERO found serious problems with governance practices in the school, that the board allowed aspects of its governance role to be assumed by the principal. It doubted the board's ability to fix the problems.

Mr Mallard said while sacking the board could cause short-term problems it was a necessary move.

"I came to the judgment on the advice of ERO that having some of the same faces that were seen to be part of the problem earlier would cause real issues for staff members who have now been disclosing the issues that weren't previously disclosed."

He emphasised the good work that was being done at the school since problems came to a head a month ago.

"What I want to make absolutely clear is that over the last month since we've had the big fuss the staff have been working exceptionally hard and exceptionally well to provide a good stable base for students."

Governance findings in the report included:

* Poorly developed school strategic management systems;

* funding for curriculum resources reduced in 2001 to enable the school to recover from a major financial deficit, with funding levels yet to be restored;

* the board failing to establish effective systems to ensure its records are kept in order;

* little confidence in the leadership of the board's chairman and divided trustees;

* the board failing to provide a safe working environment.

Meanwhile an interim hearing on Mrs Annan's case is to be held today.

- NZPA