We have constructed an education system zeroed in on one particular purpose for reading, and it’s a highly materialist, consumerist, neo-liberal one: you learn to read so you can get the grades you need to get a good job. That purpose has become so deeply rooted in the public imagination that there is little to no thought given to whether there may be other purposes. Assessment and reporting work in nicely with this purpose, acting as a salve that soothes the minds of parents that the crucial project of ensuring the future of their children is on track.

It hasn’t always been this way. In Terry Locke’s recent posts for the Aotearoa Educators Collective (By their objectives ye shall know them: Part 1 | By their objectives ye shall know them: Part 2) he makes reference to the statement of aims that were in the English curriculum in the 1980s. There were eight, including three broad language aims, one of which was “To extend each student’s imaginative and emotional responsiveness through language.” There is nothing in the current curriculum or in an NCEA achievement standard that gets close to this, and it’s a real void because it offers a window to another purpose, one that’s closer to why people actually become readers: you learn to read so you can feel the anguish and beauty that’s in the world and see other possibilities, which helps you live in it responsively, critically and carefully.

Try measuring that, though. Aside from the ethics about making quantitive judgements about someone’s imaginative and emotional ‘progress’, the level of subjectivity required to do so makes measuring a futile exercise. However, these are two aspects of being human that can grow and flourish, or be squashed and inhibited. For the former to happen requires high levels of genuine professionalism on the part of the teacher and a learning environment that is stimulating, warm and inclusive. That kind of professionalism is a threat to the vision of education the MAG has, and our Minister parrots. And as Terry writes, these kinds of ideas — such as professionalism, imagination, lifelong learning, relationships, wellbeing — exist only as propaganda in the MAG’s curriculum.

Despite neo-liberalism’s insistence, the future doesn’t just sit at the individual level. The future is us, together, and as Susan Sandretto so eloquently points out, every system of education plays a role in shaping it. And so, we must decide which version of the future we think will best serve our children. Is it one where education exclusively serves neo-liberal ends, where the point is to get qualified and get a job? In this system, money and power are the point: the child’s job is to scramble and prove themselves deserving of them (unless, of course, they are born into them, then the job becomes securing them). This the future the MAG’s curriculum is forcing into reality.

Look around at this neo-liberal world. Tell me it’s what you want for our children. Last night I read of a plastics factory that ordered its workers to stay on site as Hurricane Helene bore down on them, under instructions they were only permitted to leave when the waters were at knee level. Many of those workers died; all management survived. The day before, I read that our Prime Minister doesn’t think ‘wealth creators’ like himself should be taxed on their capital gains because that will disincentivise them from creating more wealth (that’s kept to themselves). Last week, the Ministry of Education opened its curriculum email with a karakia, then days later cut all funding for Te Ahu o te Reo Māori, which supported teachers to learn te reo Māori, and put it into an untested approach to maths learning promoted by some of the MAG’s allies: structured maths. The powerful are acting with impunity because, in the face of austerity, so many of us are on the precipice in this neo-liberal world. They are banking on us opting for either apathetic submission or craven opportunism. This is how totalitarianism takes root.

There is another version of the future, one that is less reductive and craven. Imagine the way kids would think about the world, the way they would act and the jobs that would become possible, if they became literate in a way that extended their imaginative and emotional responsiveness. But for that to happen our kids need us to choose to be courageous, now. And we can start by challenging the MAG’s narrow, illegitimately created, exclusionary, neo-liberal curriculum.

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Update

Terry and I have become members of the Aotearoa Educators Collective. We have written to friends and colleagues recommending they join as we believe it is the best way we can cohere and start to coordinate. You can read the copy of our email below.

If it moves you to join, please let us know by emailing me: bevan@bevanholloway.com 

Email copy

Kia ora

We are writing this email to colleagues (sometimes former) and friends whose commitment to quality education we admire.

As has become clear, recent developments of the national English curriculum by this government have occurred without adherence to due process and are being driven by a small lobby group (a Ministry Advisory Group [MAG] consisting of personnel approved by an ideological sect – the NZ Initiative). These developments have effectively sidelined the “curriculum refresh” as it stood at the end of 2023, which reflected the wide body of curriculum, cultural, and professional expertise that exists in this country. (For more information, visit bevanholloway.com, reading especially “How a special interest group took over the refresh of the New Zealand curriculum”.)

Based on what has been appearing on the Ministry’s website, it is becoming abundantly clear that this unwarranted modification is underpinned by a version of literacy and ‘the science of learning’ that is narrow, unbalanced, culturally non-inclusive and backward-looking. It is not going to deliver the outcomes that our children need as they face an unknowable future. It is also likely to deprofessionalise teachers by virtue of its inclination to micro-manage their practice.   

What was exposed in the documents released as a result of NZATE’s OIA request shows that we cannot stand by and wait to see what happens. It will be too late if we do; the rupture in our education system will be too great. The two of us — Bevan Holloway and Terry Locke — have been mulling over ways to consolidate the wide body of disregarded expertise that we believe exists out there in Aotearoa to cohere and speak out.

We believe that the best way to do this in the current moment is via the Aotearoa Educators Collective (AEC: aec.org.nz). It may well be that you are already a signed up member of the AEC or already know of its work. We certainly share its stated principles as found on its website.

Our principle aim at this point is to disrupt the Ministry’s apparent intention to impose the MAG’s ideologically driven revision on our schooling system. In this aim, we believe we need a critical mass of people to stand united, creative, strategic, firm and brave. 

At this stage, if it accords with your principles, we would ask you to visit the AEC website and sign up. It would be helpful for us for you to tell us that you have done so by replying to this email. We would also welcome your forwarding this email to people and organisations you believe would be interested in it. If you do this, please cc’ one of us in your email so that we have a sense of momentum building.

Kia kaha, and best wishes,

Bevan Holloway
Terry Locke (Emeritus professor: University of Waikato)