The New Zealand Principals’ Federation (NZPF) has
recently drawn attention to the plight of schools dealing
with young people in schools displaying violent behaviour
and placing other students at risk. This is not a new
phenomenon, said NZPF President, Perry Rush. There is a
growing number of young people in our schools displaying
severely violent behaviour and we have been seeking
appropriate assistance to keep these young people in
education for many years. We recognize that these
young people require appropriate expert support that schools
are not appropriately resourced to undertake, despite having
presented the Ministry with alternative models that have
Forcing children back into education with limited additional support often meant they fell through the cracks, sometimes being excluded multiple times. “Of course the ultimate outcome of a pattern of exclusion is a young person falling out of the education system and going out onto the street.”
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The Ministry of Education says it is concerned by the Federation’s stance, as every child and young person has a right to education (File photo). The federation was currently supporting a school to contest a directed enrolment, saying there needed to be urgent action to address the issue of violence in schools.
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Photo: 123RF
The Principals Federation says achievement in maths and science in particular should be ringing alarm bells and schools need more direction on what they should be teaching and the best ways to teach it.
In a letter to the secretary for education, Iona Holsted, the federation s president, Perry Rush, said New Zealand s falling scores had not provoked an urgent response and the lack of thought leadership was a serious weakness.
Holsted responded with a letter that said the Ministry of Education (MOE) was already working on the problems the federation raised and schools already had the ability, and the funding for teacher training, to change how they taught.