Resource teachers of literacy and resource teachers of Māori are “shocked and “devastated” by a proposal from the Education Minister to stop funding 174 roles from next year.
“Given that this is the Government’s mandate at the current time to improve literacy within New Zealand, it just does not make sense to take out front line, very highly trained professionals,” Resource Teachers: Literacy Association President Judith Bradley said.
Both the leaders from the Resource Teachers: Literacy Association and National Association of Resource Teachers Advisory Māori reject Education Minister Erica Stanford saying the quality of the service is inconsistent.
“She’s saying that we want to lift our children’s student achievement, and we want to do all the best, so we want to have this funding redirected to the front line,” National Association of Resource Teachers Advisory Māori chairperson Diane Tūnoho said.
“We are on the front line. We work with the kaiako (teacher). We model with the tamariki (children).”
The roles provide expertise to teachers and intervention teachers on how to improve their literacy teaching practice, and how to make assessments of a student’s learning, in line with the curriculum.
Resource teachers also work directly with students who need additional help, with demand for the service outstripping the supply of teachers and access prioritised by need.
“A teacher does not have time to individualise absolutely every programme for a student,” Bradley said.
“We’re supporting the most vulnerable students who have literacy difficulties in their families.
“The result of removing the service removes the most skilled knowledge for those children who will become illiterate adults if there is not support for them.”
In a Ministry of Education consultation document shared with schools, the agency lays out recent investments in structured literacy and Rangaranga Reo ā-Tā for Māori immersion education.
It’s estimated $55 million over four years from cutting the roles could be reinvested “into more equitable resourcing of education initiatives to deliver better learner outcomes”.
Stanford said the education sector brought the proposal to reinvest the money to the Government.
“They believe that the service, not the people, but the service is inequitable, inefficient and not optimised and we want amazing people in classrooms in front of children and so we’re just asking for the wider sector’s opinion on that when we’re looking at our broader learning support work,” she said.
The consultation document cites inconsistent practices in both services, from reports published in 2014 for Resource Teacher: Literacy and 2012 and 2008 for Resource Teacher: Māori.
The 2014 report commissioned by the Ministry of Education included that there’s a strong view that the number of roles was insufficient compared to the level of need among students and it wasn’t well-targeted to the areas with the highest needs.
Other issues reported included intended student outcomes not being clearly defined, leading to it being “challenging to assess the overall effectiveness of the Service” and practices and processes varying among resource teachers.
The 2012 report commissioned by the Ministry of Education stated that overall the Resource Teacher: Māori service was seen as a “key mechanism in supporting the professional development and practice of teachers and lifting student achievement within the Māori medium sector” but that there was significant variability in the quality and consistency between roles.
The 2008 Education Review Office report found “considerable evidence” that some resource teachers of Māori have a positive influence on student outcomes but stated for a range of reasons, the role’s potential is not always realised, including the job being “poorly defined”.
Bradley said the review was from more than 10 years ago and the association has repeatedly asked for recommendations from the report to be actioned.
Bradley said the service needs expanding to reach more vulnerable children.
“There has been no accounting for population growth in any area around New Zealand at all,” she said.
Tūnoho said Stanford needed to take responsibility for evidence in her proposal being based on outdated reports.
“The reports that she’s referring to and using against us were written in 2008 and 2012.”
Tūnoho said the Ministry seconded members of the association to give recommendations for a redesign of the service in the 2012 report, which also involved people from the Ministry, NZEI and education sector.
“If they’d followed through and picked up that report that they invested heavily in, that also involved experts in the field, we wouldn’t be in this position at the moment, but we’re absolutely disappointed that she has chosen, Minister Erica Stanford has chosen to select information and base her evidence on reports that are so outdated,” she said.
Stanford responded that the reports were relevant.
“The service hasn’t changed in many, many years,” she said.
‘Well below their peers”
Bradley said the data that is reported from the service isn’t appropriate for assessing the progress of students that they work with.
“We’re assessing students who are well, well below against their peers.
“If you have a 10-year-old working at a five year old level and you get them to seven years of reading level, that’s two years’ progress but the data will never show that because they’re still below for a 10-year-old and that’s the kind of archaic data that is being reported on,” she said.
Tūnoho said Māori medium education is lacking in resources to support teachers.
“We are lacking in staff so we are working with kaiāwhina (teacher’s aide).
“We are lacking in trained teachers so we have to fill those gaps too and I’m not talking about us stepping into the teacher’s role, I’m talking about providing support as much as we can for kaiako so they can do their job so children, tamariki Māori can succeed and that’s what we want, the focus of our job is to ensure that we lift that student achievement for Māori in particular.”
Māori principals’ group Te Akatea said in a press release that that the body joined a number of education organisations that reject the proposal.
“…The proposal makes no sense when the Government has prioritised literacy initiatives and the evidence shows tamariki Māori succeed best in Māori medium schools, where resource teachers of Māori largely work.”
Onekawa Primary teacher Bronson Meehan said a three-day workshop for structured literacy professional development provided by the Ministry was “awesome”, but it’s the regular, in-class guidance from the PhD-educated resource teacher that visits his school, among others, that’s made the difference to his literacy practice.
“The amount of tamariki that they are affecting positively as well as the support that they provide teachers and also the growth that we receive as teachers… How could you take this service away?
“It’s to the detriment of all tamariki and Aotearoa.”
The Ministry of Education’s encouraging the sector to have their say in an online survey before consultation ends on March 21.
