National standards petition goes to Parliament

An education sector union will today take a petition to Parliament outlining concerns with the implementation of national standards in schools.

The New Zealand Educational Institute (NZEI) is opposed to national standards, which set benchmarks for reading, writing and maths in primary and intermediate schools. Regular reports are sent to parents so they can see how their children are performing.

The scheme was implemented by National this year amid opposition from some boards of trustees, principals and unions.

NZEI's petition, which will be presented to Labour MP Trevor Mallard and Catherine Delahunty from the Greens, says national standards are untried and untested, could label children as failures, and could result in "damaging" league tables.

NZEI president Francis Nelson said 38,000 New Zealanders had signed the petition, which was launched in February.

"What we want now is to ensure that no school is compelled to implement the national standards until their school community is satisfied that the issues highlighted in our petition have been addressed," she said.

The New Zealand School Trustees Association said last week that most schools were getting on with implementing the standards, but there was some resistance, including eight schools which had simply refused to.

The governing boards of those schools faced getting sacked and replaced if they continued with their non-compliant stances.

- NZPA