Policy | Education

A 100% free, high quality public education system to ensure life-long learning, from early childhood to the tertiary level, is the best investment a country can make in its own future. MANA is committed to ensuring the public education system is fully equipped and funded to enable all learners to achieve to their full potential.

For this to happen, the current system needs an overhaul. More needs to be done to ensure the quality provision of early childhood education, including for children with special needs, and much more needs to be done to boost participation and quality in kōhanga reo as recommended in the 2012 Waitangi Tribunal report. Much more also needs to be done to ensure tamariki in kōhanga reo can attend a quality kura kaupapa in their local area. Alongside this, schools need to be supported by policies that are known to work, such as embedding learning in a framework of student wellbeing that includes breakfast and lunch at schools and free health care, keeping class sizes small, and the provision of culturally supportive and relevant learning contexts.

Changes also need to be made to address inequality as students’ learning achievement is directly related to the income of their parents and families: tamariki from well-off homes in well-off schools achieve higher than those in less well-off homes and schools. Raising achievement requires investment in job creation, raising the minimum wage to a living wage, and raising benefit levels to liveable levels, as well as investment in early childhood and school education.

More investment is also needed in tertiary education so that it can be provided free of charge and for students to receive a living allowance (or Universal Basic Income). High costs stop too many people from participating or stop them from enrolling in longer courses, like degree courses, which boost their employment and earning opportunities down the track. It is critical that students, staff, and communities retain their voices on the governing bodies of tertiary institutions to continue to advocate for free education.

MANA policy priorities are to:

  • Reinvigorate kōhanga reo
    • Increase the number of kōhanga reo to improve accessibility, including in low decile areas.
    • Provide funding for up to 40 hours per week for each tamaiti/kotiro.
    • Improve access to te reo classes for whānau and staff to strengthen te reo in the home.
    • Develop a policy framework to support the kaupapa of kōhanga reo, including an appropriate regulatory and licensing regime, to increase participation, quality, and the health and safety of kōhanga facilities.
    • Increase funding for kōhanga reo to implement the policy framework, equitable to that in teacher-led early childhood education.
    • Invest in training more kaiako in special education from a Māori perspective.
    • Invest in research on how to support and build the contribution of kōhanga to language revitalization and Māori educational success.
    • Fund kōhanga to provide healthy, nutritious meals for tamariki, to grow trees and gardens in their centres, and to provide health care services at kōhanga.
  • Improve the quality of early childhood education for all tamariki
    • Raise minimum regulatory standards to improve the quality of provision, including an adult:child ratio of 1:3, setting minimum qualification levels for those working in home based services, and requiring 100% qualified and registered teachers in teacher-led, centre based services.
    • Increase funding to non-profit ECE centres to meet these new minimum regulatory standards.
    • Increase Playcentre funding to remove reliance on volunteer administrators.
    • Streamline processes for parents to establish new community and state owned ECE services.
    • Further develop engagement and collaboration between parents, whānau and ECE services through resourcing and professional development.
    • Reinstate funding for research and professional development to ensure services are culturally relevant to the communities they serve, including Māori and Pacific communities.
    • Support ECE services to better support the learning and development of children with special needs.
    • Introduce government-funded breakfast and lunch programmes and health care services in all non-profit ECE centres.
  • Ensure there is a quality local kura kaupapa for all kōhanga 5 year olds
    • Increase the number of kura kaupapa Māori, and wharekura, to greatly improve accessibility to Māori immersion education, and increase funding to ensure quality of provision.
    • Invest in the ongoing development of a curriculum and assessment system that is consistent with Te Aho Matua.
    • Invest in the ongoing training and professional development of kaiako and whānau, supported by research, and including improving access to te reo classes and wānanga.
  • Support state schools to provide quality teaching and learning environments
    • Support the principle of free, state and community owned schools. Cancel public private partnership contracts for schools, kura kaupapa, and wharekura, and abolish the charter schools policy.
    • Limit class sizes in all state schools, including kura kaupapa and wharekura, to a teacher:student ratio of 1:15.
    • Invest in the ongoing training and professional development of teachers and school leaders, supported by research, to ensure the provision of culturally supportive and relevant learning contexts to engage all learners and help them succeed.
    • Expand the successful nurses in schools programme and develop schools into Taiao Hauora centres with free dental, healthcare, and social support. This includes free breakfasts and lunches in all schools – starting with those in low-decile areas first, community gardens in schools, working on the environmental issues in their area, and ensuring every school, kura kaupapa, and wharekura has easy access to a swimming pool.
    • Develop schools as hubs of community development and whānau engagement, with home-school and whanau literacy partnerships, community education, trades training and other tertiary courses available. Create new community service jobs in schools, kura kaupapa, and wharekura to support them as community hubs.
    • Abolish National Standards and replace with information that lets parents know how well their children are doing compared to other children, nationally, without the bad effects of the current direction.
    • Boost funding for special education in schools, kura kaupapa, and wharekura, including for the education of gifted and talented children, and eliminate the barriers to accessing it.
    • Improve the quality of alternative education.
    • Incorporate economic and political literacy (“Civics education”) into the curriculum at all levels to encourage critically conscious citizenship.
    • Make te reo Māori a compulsory subject in all English-medium schools alongside English, Maths, and Science, and develop a plan to ensure there are sufficient teachers and learning resources to deliver this policy.
  • Greatly improve access to tertiary education for all students
    • Abolish all fees for tertiary students of all ages, and provide students with a living allowance (or Universal Basic Income) while studying.
    • Develop a plan to write off student debt. In the meantime, there should be no further interest on student loans.
    • Provide students with community-based jobs to help them complete their courses and reduce their debt.
    • Repeal voluntary student unionism and ensure a students’ organisation exists at each tertiary institution to represent the interests of students at all levels and lead non-academic student life; the organisation will set a levy to fund this work which the institution will collect from all students on their behalf.
    • Provide graduates with incentives to work in areas where there is an identified need. Ensure that incentives are culturally appropriate where applicable.
    • Increase funding to the sector to ensure quality of provision, and ensure it is equitable across all parts of the public tertiary sector including wānanga, polytechnics, and universities.
    • Reduce unhealthy and wasteful competition by phasing out funding for PTE’s while reviewing public tertiary institutions to ensure ongoing accessibility for all students. Māori providers of tertiary education (PTEs) are to be funded as a Treaty partnership responsibility of the Crown.
    • Require public tertiary institutions to plan together for the provision of courses to meet the needs of students and community development goals, and ban the spending of tertiary education budgets on expensive and unnecessary marketing campaigns.
    • Restore funding for Adult and Community Education (ACE) to at least 2009 levels before it was cut.
    • Remove the PBRF model for allocating research funding and instead design and implement an approach that is fair and equitable, including for Māori.
    • Ensure continued funding for the Māori Centre of Research Excellence, Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga.