4. DAIL JONES (NZ First) Link to this
to the Minister of Education
Does he have confidence in the National Certificate of Educational Achievement system; if so, why?
Hon CHRIS CARTER (Minister of Education) Link to this
Yes; because the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) is a world-class qualification system that challenges students, recognises their achievement, and is proven to prepare students well for life once they leave school. The New Zealand Qualifications Authority is continuing to improve NCEA to make it as effective a measurement tool of student success as possible. According to Business New Zealand’s chief executive, Phil O’Reilly, NCEA is a very good system that gives employers news they can use, by showing the areas a student does well in.
What confidence can the Minister have in the NCEA system when the deputy chief executive of the qualifications authority, Bali Haque, in a statement dated March 2008, refers to problems such as “Teachers did not mark to the national standards for the internals.” and, further, that there will be a need to “Contact schools through our School Relationship Managers and discuss the assessment practices in the subjects for which they were outliers, and provide advice, guidance, and monitoring, if appropriate.”, which indicates that there are problems within the NCEA system that this Minister does not appear to recognise?
What I recognise is that NCEA is getting better all the time as we refine it. I would like to quote Roger Moses, principal of Wellington College and a former NCEA critic, who said just yesterday that monitoring shows that the New Zealand Qualifications Authority is becoming far more rigorous in addressing issues of credibility with external assessment. Principals involved in this process—and I have a large list of them here—are being very positive about the process of looking at the system and making sure it is working properly. The data the member quoted is actually about improving the system.
Hon Marian HobbsWhat reports has the Minister seen about the reaction of secondary school principals to the New Zealand Qualifications Authority’s initial analysis of 2006 NCEA results?
I have already quoted Roger Moses and his positive comments, including a comment that it is a heck of a lot better than it was some years ago. Arthur Graves, chair of the Secondary Principals Council, whom I met this morning, said that people need not be alarmed by the information that the member has just quoted, and that this is just an honest, in-house analysis of raw data, and Peter Gall, the Secondary Principals Association president, said that students do better in work marked at school because they are more relaxed and have more time: “It’s a no-brainer.”
What steps does the Minister intends to take with regard to the list of 63 schools that independent research has indicated have been “relatively generous” with their internal assessments of the NCEA system in one or more subjects, and, perhaps more important, with regard to the fact that 61 schools had teachers who gave lower grades than examiners, which might have had an effect on some students being unable to enter university; and is the Minister still confident that the NCEA system is working satisfactorily?
I am confident that it is working well and so are professionals like school principals who are involved in the process. The Government has taken lots of steps to improve NCEA. We have introduced Excellence and Merit standards to NCEA certificates from 2007, we are introducing Excellence and Merit standards at subject level from this year, and we have taken a whole lot of other steps, including an extensive resourcing for moderating and checking that exams being marked internally are being done properly. The member has quoted raw data from an initial study that is in its very early stages. I say again that school principals who are involved at the coalface of this process are very positive about NCEA, including some who were critical in the beginning.
Anne TolleyIs it not all a bit “Mickey Mouse” when most of the 124 schools named in the New Zealand Qualifications Authority study knew nothing until the media contacted them; and should not schools expect that in the light of such an explosive report they would at least get a heads-up from the ministry?
I cannot comment on that, because I am not sure whether it is even correct. I can say that school principals who have been interviewed in the media in the last 24 hours—a wide range of them, including some who were critics of the system at its beginning—have been very positive about what is happening. I would like to assure the House that the so-called study the member has just quoted is in fact looking at raw data from right at the beginning of a process to look at the 2006 results. We do not know what will come out of that but I am certain, though, that we will see NCEA, an exam system that is world-class, improving all the time.