Cathy Wylie: Making more of our education strengths

The Ministry of Education will need to support communities to learn from each other. Photo / Thinkstock

Auckland consistently ranks highly in lists of the world's best cities but is never number one. So what would it take to turn Auckland into a first-class city? This week the Herald begins a 10-day series examining some of the biggest hurdles Auckland faces, from housing and transport to entertainment and education. We look at what we are doing, what we need to do, and why Auckland's success matters to the rest of the country. In part three of the series we look at education.

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• WORLD CLASS AUCKLAND - Part 1: Housing
• WORLD CLASS AUCKLAND - Part 2: Environment

Three weeks ago the 2014 National Standards levels for primary and intermediate students were released. Overall, there's been little change to our children's maths, reading and writing levels over the last three years. The Ministry of Education talks of the need for "faster and larger improvements" to be made if its goal of 85 percent of students to achieve at or above the standards will be met in 2017. But how well set up is our system to make such improvements?

We have some real strengths. New Zealand has a world-leading curriculum. We're ahead of the game when it comes to recognising the importance of both the 'hard' and 'soft' skills that are needed in our rapidly changing society and economy. We're ahead of many other countries too when it comes to knowing - in principle - how important it is to use evidence of learning to check how effective our teaching has been, to inquire into what we could do differently if students are struggling. We've been quick to embrace digital technology in our schools as (often strapped) budgets allow. Go into many schools now, and the classrooms will look and feel and sound quite different from your own schooling. Go into Auckland schools where they're working hard to improve their students' reading, writing and maths, and there's a real buzz of purposeful activity. Individual schools can show you how performance has improved, and not at the expense of science, social studies, or essential skills like critical thinking and relating to others.

But these schools are not every school. Our education system is too fragmented. Our world-leading curriculum hasn't been sufficiently supported so that all schools know how to weave those hard and soft skills together in a meaningful way. It's dispiriting for individual schools when what they try doesn't make a difference for their students, reaches a stubborn plateau, or works well for some students, but not others.

If you want a whole system to keep improving, you need to make sure that you nest schools within networks that connect them with knowledge and support that they can use - and develop further to contribute back to the learning networks. The IES policy setting up 'communities of schools', and now the hopefully more flexible 'communities of learning' announced recently through the joint education initiative between NZEI and the Ministry of Education should counter that fragmentation.

If these new networks are to succeed, they'll need sufficient support and time to bed down well. Our schools are all too used to operating on their own. Building trust will be essential in the formation of each community - and that will require wise facilitation. Ready access to expertise that can partner with each community will also be essential. Auckland's communities of schools or learners can only be effective if the local Ministry of Education works with them as a partner wanting their success, and is able to ensure the necessary expertise is readily available. The Ministry of Education will also need to support communities to learn from each other, and share that learning nationally. We have to become a 'learning system' if we are to see real system-wide gains.

• Cathy Wylie is Chief Researcher, NZ Council for Educational Research.