Hobbs Marian: Urgent Debates — Education—School Review Programme 
Hobbs Marian: Urgent Debates — Education—School Review Programme 
[Volume:615;Page:11237] 
Hon MARIAN HOBBS (Associate Minister of Education) 
: 
 I am puzzled. This is an urgent debate and I have been struggling to stay awake because the sense of urgency has kind of gone out of this debate. I want to take some of the arguments that have been put up. The ACT member waxed lyrical about the need for choice. As a former principal I have always loved this argument about the need for choice because it presumes that everybody in Auckland wants his or her child to go to Auckland Grammar. I once heard it put out by a member of the Opposition who argued very strongly on this issue of choice that 400 Auckland Grammars should be replicated throughout New Zealand and what would be wrong with that? That would be giving people choice. There is a fallacy in some of these arguments about choice. 
But then the member Deborah Coddington went against herself because she said that she had looked at overseas research which said that big schools produced bad behaviour. Tell that to Auckland Grammar with 2400 pupils! Tell that to Burnside High School with 2600 pupils! Tell that to any number of schools that are doing— 
Hon Brian Donnelly 
: Rangitoto! 
Hon MARIAN HOBBS 
: —I thank the member Rangitoto College—absolutely marvellous work with their children. Tell them that overseas research undertaken by Deborah Coddington the member for ACT absolutely means that big schools produce bad behaviour. What ludicrous argument is that? 
I have to say though not so angrily that Bernie Ogilvy from United Future—also quoting overseas research—says that smaller schools are better. Let us examine that argument. We now have a quite complex curriculum particularly with technology. If one goes into a years 7 and 8 classroom—the old intermediate stage or the top of the primary school—and looks at its technology curriculum and what needs to be provided by the teachers for a school of 40 50 or 60 pupils one will see that they cannot; the school has to bus its kids in. When people talk about busing in kids for years 7 and 8 technology they are talking about quite a long bus ride for some of those kids in the middle of the day. One would rather have them on the buses than integrating the schools. 
But let us go even further and look at a school of 120 pupils that is 20 minutes out of a major centre—a 20-minute bus ride on a flat tar-sealed road. How is that school able to provide year-13 children with physics chemistry biology design technology and all those things? I think one has to be very careful before getting on one’s high horse and saying either that big schools present problems or little schools are the only way to go. 
Then I come to Bill English who kind of accepts that closure of schools is inevitable. He said again today—other than the points that he was making 3 weeks ago—that he would have education development initiatives—that is reviews of one-teacher schools or schools where 30 percent of the classrooms are empty. That is really interesting because there was a policy once where schools were all built in permanent materials of brick or wood. When Kaikorai Valley High School dropped its roll from 1400 to 400 or 300 it had all these empty brick classrooms. It is now always so that a school will have 25 percent of its classrooms able to be shifted around because we always expect that school rolls will fluctuate up and down. 
But Bill English accepted that. He said today that communities in Invercargill Grey Valley and Timaru would accept some closures. That is actually what is happening in one sense. If we look at the issue that Mr Donnelly raised that the policy should not be based on protest or polls I think one will see—if one reads what the Minister has put out—-that if schools have bad reports from the Education Review Office lack viability or for instance have questions where parents as in the example the member gave want to merge then that will be an exception to the moratorium and they will continue. 
 That is the same sort of thing that Bill English is arguing for too. He argued that there should be a review of all one-teacher schools. Some one-teacher schools will always survive because the distance to the school actually mitigates against closing the school.But some one-teacher schools may have to close and Bill English said that. He accepts that that sort of thing continues. 
I want to come to Rod Donald’s process. He said we should stop the current review process already going on in 71 schools. Through being responsible for school buses I know—for my sins—that parents have been acting for the last 12 months on the potential for their schools to close and have been transferring their kids. We need to go through this process the full way to be really sure. I understand that the Minister said very clearly that it would be done on a school-by-school basis. That does not mean that 71 schools will close. The review will look at the situation and continue to do so. The Minister will make that decision in April. 
The real reason the Minister said that we should turn away from this policy of constant review over the next 5 years is that he knows he has been doing some amazing work in the early years of primary education in particular. The work of Russell Bishop on the role of the teacher is absolutely pivotal. I nearly fell out of the shower one morning when I heard it explained and accepted that the teacher is pivotal in how a child learns. For so long everyone has said that it is the size of the school or the socio-economic background of the child. Russell Bishop put it out there very strongly and said: “It is the teacher and how that child learns that is absolutely pivotal to success.” 
That work has been going on unrecognised under this very good Minister of Education let alone the work being done in literacy and numeracy. We faced a problem in this country that we had our top students as the Programme for International Student Assessement report stated rating right at the top of Europe and the OECD. But in New Zealand—within schools not between schools—we have a tail that is the longest of any country; a tail between the average and the failing. That tail has to be addressed. 
Did this Minister ignore that? No way! In no uncertain terms he moved to turn round how children learn numeracy. I wonder whether all those people like Rod Donald who have been busy going to schools sat down in a year 1 or year 2 mathematics class and saw the change of work the change in style of teaching what has been provided for teachers and the training that has gone on because this Government wants to ensure that we do not have that tail and that every child achieves to the limit of his or her ability. That is what this Minister wants to concentrate on. That is what this Government wants to concentrate on and if the rumpus around closing schools detracts from what is a really important job then I absolutely support our Minister in doing that. 
He made reference to something called asTTle tools which have kind of passed people by. Let me say as a former principal that when I was taking students into year 9 I was sometimes quite surprised when parents would roll up and I would put out the test in front of them and say: “Do you know that your kid’s got a bit of a reading problem and we will have to look at some extra work?”. They would say: “A reading problem? Didn’t know my kid had that. School reports didn’t say that.” This Minister with his asTTle tools will ensure that parents do understand where their kids are and whether they are succeeding—not in a comparison with schools or a big sheet in the newspaper but something that is for that child and that learner. It is an assessment for diagnostic tools. That is the way that we ought to go and I think that this Minister has done an extraordinary job. 
I want to end with this comment. Not very often but sometimes people say—and I heard it in this debate—that maybe Mr Mallard moved away on this issue because he was sort of running scared. I remind members that the first set of schools that Mr Mallard looked at was in a town in his own electorate—Wainuiomata. 
Deborah Coddington 
: Crocodile tears! 
Hon MARIAN HOBBS 
: No not crocodile tears Ms Coddington actual facts. Mr Mallard did it in his own electorate. That member does not have an electorate to do that in but he has. He owned up to his people and he worked with his community to do that. I admire that integrity and that guts.