Funding plan too vague, principal says

FUND FAIL: Masterton Primary School principal Sue Walters. PHOTO/FILE

A Masterton principal has joined a chorus of disapproval sounded against the idea of performance-based funding for schools.

Education Minister Hekia Parata last week told the New Zealand Herald she was looking to link the funding of schools to the progress of their pupils.

The Ministry of Education was calculating new decile rankings from last year's quake-delayed census for the 2500 schools in New Zealand, while Ms Parata described the existing regime, which paid more to schools in deprived neighbourhoods, as a "blunt instrument".

The minister had since backtracked on her comments and denied a radical funding shakeup was imminent, saying any conversation about a change in funding would include teachers and principals. The Opposition have called the suggestion "loopy" and teachers branded the idea as "crazy".

Masterton Primary School principal Sue Walters agreed the decile funding system was "a bit of a blunt instrument" but said she believed the idea of funding linked to pupils' performance was "too vague".

She said decile funding was based on data taken from the last census, which "made everything five years out of date".

She also questioned the efficacy of census data that "skewed" the actual circumstances on which decile funding was based, but was opposed as well to performance-based funding because of a lack of information regarding the system.

"I don't agree with robbing from the poor to give to the rich and I don't agree that schools should get rewarded for producing wonderful results as per National Standards, which are pretty ropy, anyway. That would mean our funding will be based on a false premise.

"If you're going to give more money to those schools than the schools who are trying hard to cater for seriously disadvantaged kids, then all you're doing is disadvantaging those kids even more.

"The National Standards were put out to us as a fait accompli. There was no consultation," she said.

"We need more information about performance funding, just like with this thing about expert principals.

"We, in the profession, are not getting enough information. We're not getting told how this is all going to happen," Ms Walters said.