National Standards 2016: Retrospective insights, continuing uncertainties and new questions

Abstract

New Zealand’s National Standards policy has been deeply controversial in the education sector, especially amongst primary teachers and principals. This article provides a view of the National Standards from their introduction up until 2016, nearly a decade after they were first mooted. The issues covered: (i) offer retrospective insights, (ii) acknowledge continuing uncertainties, or (iii) ask questions that had become newly relevant by 2016. They include processes within the Ministry of Education, the role of advisory groups, the public release of National Standards data, and the origins and impact of the National Standards. They also include whether teachers and principals have been gradually won over to the National Standards, use of the National Standards in ‘social investment’, the Progress and Consistency Tool and possible wider political purposes of headline policies like the National Standards. A theme that connects the issues is concern about policy processes. The article concludes by calling for a more genuine commitment by Government to evidence-informed policy.