Pillay Lynne: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Pillay Lynne: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:618;Page:13921] 
8.  
LYNNE PILLAY (Labour—Waitakere) 
 to the  
Minister of Education 
: What steps is he taking to ensure that secondary school students develop critical numeracy skills? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Minister of Education) 
: 
 About 430 secondary school maths teachers who teach around 10000 year 9 and year 10 maths students will take part in the secondary numeracy project—a $1 million professional development project to improve the quality of maths teaching. This builds on the success of the numeracy development project in primary and intermediate schools since 2000 which has benefited over 300000 students. Research shows that our 15-year-olds are third in the OECD in numeracy skills but at the lower end there are large numbers of students not performing so well. Our Government is determined to lift education standards so that every single student benefits and this project will be key in delivering those goals. 
Lynne Pillay 
: How does numeracy fit with other Government priorities in education? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: This Government is committed to ensuring that all New Zealanders get a fair go. We want all students to leave school able to read and write and with good mathematical skills. We are investing heavily in the basics of education—for example this year $43 million in literacy initiatives alone and over $12 million in numeracy initiatives. We have put 2000 extra teachers in schools over and above roll growth. Operational funding has increased by over 23 percent since 1999 which adjusted for inflation and roll growth amounts to an increase in real terms of over 10 percent. This Government is committed to education. 
Hon Bill English 
: When will the Minister make publicly available nationally comparable data on numeracy for different schools different regions and different gender and ethnic groups? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: There is quite a lot of work going on at the moment developing a base for that work. I do accept that it is important for schools and for parents to see how their school works vis-à-vis other schools of the same type. It is a little bit away from the straight numeracy question but it applies in that area as well as in some others. 
Hon Brian Donnelly 
: Will the Minister confirm that there is a significant shortfall in the content qualifications—not pedagogical qualifications but content qualifications—held by those teaching year 9 and year 10 mathematics not just numeracy and what is he doing to rectify this recognised problem? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: It is fair to say there are some issues right through our society in mathematics and in numeracy in particular. We saw examples of it of course late last year in people who were in this House. We are working hard to attract mathematics teachers. We are paying them to train rather than having them pay to train. That is making some difference. One of our real problems though is that not enough of our secondary school students who go on to be teachers are those who have good mathematical skills and are confident with those skills.