Posts by Hilary Stace
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Hard News: Friday Music: When there were…, in reply to Joe Wylie,
Wet Ones were perfect for cleaning up when changing nappies. Were in widespread use in the early 1980s. (#trivia)
-
Hard News: Moving from frustration to disgust, in reply to Kumara Republic,
No, Karori and Kelburn are out of the Onslow zone these days and only have Wgtn High or Girls/Boys to chose from. Wadestown and Wilton just squeeze into both. The point is that the lower decile schools close by Wgtn Coll are out of zone for their local secondary school while higher decile ones across town are zoned in. So Newtown boys have to bus a few kilometres away to lower decile Rongotai College and airport noise.
Incidentally, Rongotai's gym recently burned down. But instead of helping this poorer local school out, the Weta guys gave a huge endowment of facilities to the private and very wealthy boys' school Scots College. They don't seem to realise that creativity and other useful skills are much more likely to be nurtured in the state system than in that highly privileged environment.
-
Not just Auckland. Wellington College's home zone excludes Newtown, Island Bay and Berhampore, which are within walking distance, but includes Karori and Wadestown which are on the other side of Wellington.
-
As an aside, good old nzhistory.net has documented the rise of NZ rock music festivals (including Redwood 70 which I attended and which seemed huge, but only had 9000 people).
-
Hard News: Moving from frustration to disgust, in reply to Jackie Clark,
Well said, Jackie.
-
Hard News: Moving from frustration to disgust, in reply to Bart Janssen,
The best teachers aren't necessarily the most expensive (ie older/more experienced) ones. But good teachers are often head hunted by other schools who offer them more choice about classes, fewer contact hours, after school activities etc.
In my experience of schools what teachers like are:
a) to be appreciated by their peers, school management and boards, students and communities - little things like the board putting on a thankyou morning tea occasionally or the PTA helping with meet the teacher nights or (reliable) parents helping with school activities, or acknowledgement from the boss
b) be supported by same so no isolating and bullying from other teachers, management etc, and good support/admin staff
c) access to good professional development, and then an opportunity to apply it
d) efficient and fair school management processes and governance - so things like access to leave is fair and course budgets can be rolled over if not used in a year
e) good opportunities for collaboration within school and with teachers in other schools, and a culture of encouragement of good ideas
f) non class time factored into day for marking or contacting parents (harder to do in primary)
g) fewer students overall, particularly if some are quite time consuming (and then specialist help is appreciated)
h) fewer stupid government policies and Min of Ed compliance requirements
i) better pay or recognition of workload, better status,
j) warmer, drier, quieter, more modern physical environment/buildings -
Short caution re League Tables from CCSDisability Action
-
Hard News: Women and their representations, in reply to Lilith __,
Julia Brooke-White. Typically of women, she's not that good at self-promotion - but those in the know know. Particularly wonderful craft photography.
-
We are very lucky to have a centralised education system and a strongly unionised teacher workforce. Our education system survived Education Minister Merv Wellington and his insistence on schools flying the flag; we survived the worst of the neoliberal excesses of the 1990s when schools spent a lot of time and effort fighting each other in a battle for the survival of the fittest (Charmaine Poutney's book of the era describes some of the casualties); we survived (just) Lockwood Smith's Special Education 2000 (where the Daniels case originated from), and we survived bulk funding. National Standards, charter schools and league tables will die with this government, and then there will be a new set of issues to battle, once there is an education friendly government again - probably demands for more money for the sector, more pay for teachers and smaller class sizes. Hopefully, somewhere the status of teachers and teaching will improve, although I expect sections of the media and the public will keep attacking them, precisely because they are a strong and effective profession.
-
Hard News: Women and their representations, in reply to Jackie Clark,
The first New Zealand Fat Studies conference is being held at Massey Wellington in July. I think this is a subject that will hear more about as people (mainly women) reclaim it as an academic discipline rather as something shameful. One of the organisers I see has the best name - Cat Pause.