Education Minister Erica Stanford’s investment can help future-proof learning support – Patrick Walsh

Erica Stanford announced a significant investment of $118 million for education. Photo / Mark Mitchell

THREE KEY FACTS

• Education Minister Erica Stanford announced significant investment for learning support in the upcoming Budget.
• The $118 million investment aims to improve education for neurodiverse and disabled children.
• Concerns exist that funds may be ineffective if spent within the current system model.

The recent announcement by Education Minister Erica Stanford that this month’s Budget is likely to contain a significant investment for learning support was universally welcomed by the school sector.

The minister has said she has listened to the collective voice of principals, teachers, parents and advocacy groups working with neurodiverse children. This is wonderful news!

For over 30 years, the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children in Aotearoa/New Zealand have been poorly served by our education system. It is a decades-long national disgrace aggravated by the fact that disabled and neurodiverse children are protected by United Nations Conventions that New Zealand has signed up to.

Our own domestic legislation also specifically gives these children a right to a quality education free from discrimination. This is not the reality.

As an education leader for more than 20 years, I have witnessed dozens of failed reviews of learning support, ineffective leadership by the Ministry of Education and a bureaucracy that incentivises wasteful spending and punishes parents. We have a current system that has a low trust of principals as professional leaders, creates barriers to access funding and ultimately denies these children the same educational opportunities offered to other students. This is not acceptable.

The greatest fear from the education sector is that if the proposed $118 million taken from Kahui Ako (Communities of Learning) is spent within the current model, it will have zero effect, destroying the legitimate expectation of parents and educators of a “fit-for-purpose” system. In a tough fiscal environment, every dollar counts, including in the education sector. In order to future-proof meeting the needs of disabled and neurodiverse students, the following must be done:

• Early Intervention. The early years, 0-5, make the biggest and most sustained difference. At present, the early childhood sector receives no funding for children who are neurodiverse. The parents have to wait until the child enrols in a primary school. This is a lost opportunity and makes no educational sense. It is both necessary and desirable to invest in the early childhood sector.
• Students with disabilities and neurodiversity often have a complex set of needs including educational, physical and pastoral. Parents and teachers require a pool of experts who can conduct assessments, make a diagnosis and develop a plan for children in collaboration with the parents, the child and teachers. At present, a request for a diagnosis of fetal alcohol syndrome, for instance, can take months, costing thousands of dollars.
• Delivering the curriculum, assessment and meeting the pastoral needs of neurodiverse children and children with disabilities requires an expert level of knowledge, skill and an inclusive mindset that teachers need to develop. Access to high quality professional development in this space will be critical to success.
• As far as possible, the decision-making on learning support resources must be made at a local level. Principals and parents who live in the school community and know the child are best-placed to determine needs and a plan. There must of course be an accountability mechanism back to the Ministry of Education to show added value. Centralised control of learning support by the Ministry of Education with a heavy bureaucratic blanket has been a dismal failure.

Stanford is to be applauded for listening to the education sector and parents. We are delighted that she is championing this cause. An investment of more than $100m is a great start. It must, however, be poured into a system that has a blueprint to future-proof the success of these children, who deserve much better than what is currently being served up. Money alone won’t make the difference, as we have learnt from bitter experience over the last 30 years.