tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6950169.post8175676575353036304..comments2023-07-21T11:27:59.169+02:00Comments on Education & Skills Today: All that money can’t buyCassandra Davishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02144529034699876259noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6950169.post-71574934673600103732012-02-25T20:24:09.477+01:002012-02-25T20:24:09.477+01:00Like Paul says, in NZ we perform well according to...Like Paul says, in NZ we perform well according to the PISA studies. However we are facing some serious issues<br />a) Forced implementation of "National Standards" with league tables - over 200 of our schools have refused to implement them and are facing the threat of commissioners being sent in.<br />b) Charter Schools<br />c) Probable "performance pay"<br />These are current government policy directions. Other issues are....<br />d) Feminisation of education - low numbers of males particulaly in Primary and early childhood education.<br />e) Relatively low pay and status for teachers. (The Govt line of "incompetent teachers failing their students, particularly the underachievers" - doesn't help.<br />f) Possible moves to increase class sizes - recommended by Treasury to reduce education costs<br />g) Disengagement by the govt and Minister of Ed from education professionals and education sector groups.<br />Discouragement and disallusionment amongst a growing number of teacher colleagues.<br /><br />As a teacher of 35 years service I hold big concerns for the direction our government is taking us - and may well see our great performance in the PISA study deteriate unless these issues are addressed.Mr Chttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15493595541488852376noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6950169.post-55284934982678588252012-02-21T04:32:05.575+01:002012-02-21T04:32:05.575+01:00New Zealand does well in PISA but whilst being sma...New Zealand does well in PISA but whilst being small is not homogenous nor wealthy.<br /><br />We perform well because our teachers are innovative, we have a broad curriculum which allows for teachers to do their work, and schools are run by local communities. Sadly, all this is under threat by the worst government we have had in 20 years and their illogical desire to follow US approaches to teaching developed not in the halls of Education reasearch but rather in the Chicago School of Economics.Paulnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6950169.post-61005427924274794242012-02-20T14:30:04.636+01:002012-02-20T14:30:04.636+01:00To Anonymous:
Performance in PISA is the result ...To Anonymous: <br /><br />Performance in PISA is the result the quality of teachers as well as many other factors. In particular, we find that the extent to which countries commit to making all students achieve by not differentiating struggling students through grade repetition, transfers or streaming is a powerful predictor of national performance. In the case of Spain, over a third of students declare having repeated a grade at least once, meaning that schools and teachers wait until the end of the year to do something about struggling students. Other successful countries identify struggling students early and provide the necessary support as soon as possible to avoid students lagging behind and, by avoiding repetition, avoid the negative stigmas associated with failing a grade which prevents students from benefitting academically from grade repetition.<br /><br />To Alex Jones:<br /><br /><br />There are indeed high performing countries that are wealthy, small and culturally homogeneous (Iceland, Singapore, Hong Kong-China; may be Finland and Norway could fit that category too) but there are other diverse and "big" countries that are successful performers: Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, and Japan, for example. Estonia is not necessarily rich but has similar performance to Switzerland and Belgium which cater to culturally diverse populations and all three score well above the OECD average. Also, Luxembourg would qualify as a small, wealthy, homogeneous country, but does not show high performance. <br />This goes to say that high performance in PISA is not easy to predict from cultural homogeneity, wealth and size. Countries do have leverage on how to improve performance beyond constraints that come outside the characteristics of the student population and/or the resources that are available to invest in education.Guillermo Montthttp://www.pisa.oecd.orgnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6950169.post-64865598484702741202012-02-16T16:11:01.549+01:002012-02-16T16:11:01.549+01:00Isn't a fairly strong correlation between top ...Isn't a fairly strong correlation between top PISA performers and small, relatively wealthy and culturally homogeneous states?Alex Joneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02052509459608113801noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6950169.post-4978480453534773942012-02-16T13:25:57.000+01:002012-02-16T13:25:57.000+01:00The teachers' earns in Spain are high, but the...The teachers' earns in Spain are high, but the performance in PISA is medium. There are important diferences in tearchers earning between spaninsh regions ("comunidades autónomas"), but the region with best earnings is not the regions with best performance.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com