Why teachers need to strike again

Thousands of teachers demand better pay
Thousands of striking secondary school teachers marched in centres around the country this afternoon, protesting stalled talks over pay and conditions, as Education Minister Anne Tolley urged them to return to the negotiating table.

The one-day strike was the first in eight years for the 16,000 members of the Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA) and affected about 280,000 students from more than 450 secondary and intermediate schools.

It is seeking a 4 per cent pay rise and improved working conditions for its members and has rejected the Ministry of Education's offer of 1.5 percent this year and a further 1 percent next year.

Teachers need to strike again, why? Because this Government hates public education. Look at the gutting of adult education classes , look at Anne Tolley letting junk food back into school tuck shops as a response to obesity?, and look at New Zealand's poorest high schools losing thousands of dollars each year because of a Government policy billed as helping more children to play sport.

Let's not pretend National don't have the money for public education, because they sure as hell had $35 million to give to their mates in the private education industry.

ANd what is the cherry on the top of the argument that National hate public education? Two wards, National Standards.

National Standards are an ideological attempt by Tolley to introduce a fake competition into the Education industry by using these flawed measuring standards to secretly build a league table which would benefit National's mates in the Private Education industry, being forced to listen to Tolley lie about how people support this joke is almost as excruciating as watching Heather Roy and Rodney Hide kiss and make up.

This is NOT about the educational achievement of NZ children because national standards like this are pointless because they show nothing of any educational value because children develop at very different stages this early on in their educational life. How do we know this to be true? Because our undisputed educationalists like John Hattie bloody well tells us so!

Here is what he has said about National's failed experiment of free market ideology in education:

Could be the most disastrous education policy ever formulated.

Will only barely raise student achievement, if at all.

Could "pervert the nature of teaching" by pitting schools and teachers against one another.

Hattie also writes that the standards themselves – the targets students will be measured against – are "untested and experimental" and need to be drawn up based on evidence, not committees.

Hmmmm, “Could be the most disastrous education policy ever formulated”, see even if I was a humper for National, surely those kind of warnings could get through and make an impact. And let's not forget Tolley lied about parental support for her league tables by stealth...

'Three Rs' plan alarms parents
AN OFFICIAL report reveals one-third of parents had concerns about the new national school standards system before it was launched – despite the government's claims the system has a "strong mandate" from parents.

These league tables National have been trying to smuggle in under the national standards regime have been sold to NZ as having the support of parents yet an official report released shows that 38% of parents made negative comments about National’s plans and only 14% made positive comments. Yet Education Minister Anne Tolley’s press release on the report read, ‘Patents support National Standards’ – no they didn’t only 14% did, 38% were negative.

Teachers need to strike, strike and strike again, National hate public education and we have seen only mass protest works against this Government.