English Bill: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
English Bill: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
[Volume:626;Page:21050] 
8.  
Hon BILL ENGLISH (National—Clutha-Southland) 
 to the  
Minister of Education 
: Has he been advised of a workload study that reportedly says the NCEA is placing increasing strain on teachers with many teachers believing their high workloads constrain their quality of teaching; if so what action does he intend to take? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Minister of Education) 
: 
 I assume the member is referring to the secondary teacher workload study report which states something different. The report states at page 9: “Teachers generally felt the work involved in implementing the NCEA was becoming more manageable as people were growing more familiar with it.” I commend the report to the member. 
Hon Bill English 
: Can the Minister confirm that one reason that the National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) provides what the report calls “administrivia” for teachers is that New Zealand Qualifications Authority officials are visiting schools and telling staff they should not use the assessments that are on the Ministry of Education website because those assessments have not been moderated by the New Zealand Qualifications Authority and they will not be valid for students and when will he get these two agencies to talk to each other? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: There has been a considerable amount of discussion between those two agencies recently including some of it in my office. 
Lynne Pillay 
: What measures has the Government undertaken to improve the quality of teaching? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: This Government has moved substantially to address the underfunding of teachers. For example the number of teachers in secondary schools and area schools is 1679 full-time teachers over and above those required for roll growth in the period of this Government. Budget 2005 introduces an extra 417 teachers. The quality will be improved by the 5 hours non-contact time which will be in for all teachers— 
Hon Bill English 
: Less teaching! 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: Yes and more work on preparation. One of the things the member will find useful even in his political career is that a little preparation is a good thing; it goes a long way. The total secondary teacher salary bill has increased by 29 percent since we became Government. 
Deborah Coddington 
: In light of a recent Colmar Brunton survey of 1001 New Zealand parents that showed that 79 percent want schools to offer alternative exams to NCEA such as International Baccalaureate or Cambridge A levels and only 31 percent of those parents have confidence in the value of NCEA why will he not let parents choose and allow schools to dump NCEA? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: I think there are probably three points to make. The first point is that I do not think that was a survey of parents. I think it was part of a general Colmar Brunton approach rather than specifically a survey of parents. The second point is that there is already considerable flexibility around alternative examination methods and that is shown by the fact that both the International Baccalaureate and the Cambridge exams are used extensively through New Zealand. I do not think there is any legal obligation for schools to offer NCEA at all. 
Hon Bill English 
: Can the Minister confirm that the Labour Government worked hard to give the impression that it had fixed the New Zealand Scholarship after the 2004 debacle and can he also confirm that almost halfway through the school year the New Zealand Qualifications Authority website today states: “Information relating to Scholarship 2005 will require some modification and will be available once it is confirmed.”; and what does he expect teachers to teach their scholarship students when half way through the year the New Zealand Qualifications Authority has no specifications for it? 
Hon TREVOR MALLARD 
: The curriculum. 
Hon Bill English 
: I seek leave to table the page from the New Zealand Qualifications Authority website making it clear that no information is available on the New Zealand Scholarship. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? Yes there is.