education gazette

Lifting achievement for all students and increasing participation at school continue to be a significant focus for the Ministry of Education. Each year too many young people leave school without achieving the qualifications they need to succeed and do not go on to participate in any further study or training. These young people are most vulnerable at times when work is difficult to get.

Initiatives announced last week provide the framework for taking the work the ministry has been doing to the next level. Many schools around the country have developed innovative and creative approaches designed to be more responsive to the needs of their students, so that they want to stay at school longer, achieve higher qualifications and go on to further learning.

Over the next year, we will take a closer look at some of those initiatives to build the evidence base of what works, to lift participation and achievement in education. The focus will be on identifying ways to improve flexibility for students, build effective partnerships between schools and their communities, test the portability of education plans, improve advice and guidance for students and assist young people at risk of early disengagement from education.

Education plans

Some schools are already taking an education planning approach, with very encouraging results. We need to learn from these schools, so we can introduce effective education plans, for all students from Year 9 by 2011.

Education plans will give students a structured way of documenting their intended education and career objectives and how they plan to achieve those objectives. Education plans will be developed by schools in consultation with the student, their parents, family and whanau. Young people's interests, options and pathways to the next steps in their learning beyond school will be identified. This will assist them to make a smooth transition from school to tertiary or workplace learning.

Career advice

During the two months of discussions earlier this year, students told us that they need better advice and guidance to help them identify their options and to make the right choices in education and work. Next year, a number of schools will be involved in looking at ways of integrating careers advice throughout the school. An extended careers guidance package will be developed for all secondary schools over the next two years.

The secondary tertiary alignment resource

There will be more funding for STAR next year so that more students will have the chance to experience a tertiary environment and participate in subjects not available within schools. The rules will be amended to improve the range of programmes schools can offer their students.

Cash for buildings

Schools get an entitlement for additional buildings if their student numbers increase.

In 2009, changes will be made to give schools the flexibility to choose between building new classrooms or accessing alternative facilities that better accommodate the changing learning needs of their students. This may include leasing private or community-owned venues, or paying tertiary providers, other schools or employers for access to their facilities.

Youth Training

The current investment in Youth Training provides pre-employment education and training to young people under 18 years, with no or low qualifications. The programme is currently available to young people who have left school. The programme will be extended next year to trial a limited number of school-tertiary partnerships. These partnerships will test how schools can better access this investment to offer young people, particularly those at significant risk of disengagement, the opportunity to learn in different environments while remaining connected to school.

Alternative education

Alternative Education students will be able to participate as dual enrolled students with the Correspondence School from Term 3 this year, without any cost to their Alternative Education provider.

Curriculum and NCEA

The flexibility of learning offered by the new New Zealand Curriculum and NCEA will provide the platform to support schools so that they can offer students a range of learning options that are most relevant to them, encouraging them to stay at school, complete qualifications and then continue to build on their qualifications after they leave school.

Working together

Achieving the Schools Plus goal – keeping all young people in education or training until 18 – will require a phased approach to transforming the secondary schooling system. I want to say thank you to those who put forward views and ideas during the discussion period. These discussions will continue as we work towards implementing Schools Plus.