Secondary principals slam Labour’s policy

The Herald reports:

Secondary school principals have slammed a Labour proposal for free driving lessons in school hours as “low-level thinking that is not helpful”.

Some things don’t change.

Secondary School Principals Association president Mike Williams, the principal of Pakuranga College, said many secondary schools already provided driver education, which has been available for the National Certificate of Educational Achievement(NCEA) since 2015.

New Labour leader Jacinda Ardern announced today that Labour would spend $50 million a year on a “school leaver toolkit” including five free professional driving lessons, a free defensive driving course and free tests for learner’s and restricted licences.

The “toolkit” would also include compulsory “civics” education in Years 11 to 13 and options for budgeting, financial literacy, work experience and practical certificates such as first aid and heavy machinery licences.

Beware what Labour call civics education. This is basically indoctrination about the importance of unions, voting for Labour etc. I’ll support compulsory civics education in schools if I get to write the syllabus!

Williams said: “If those are the biggest issues there are in education, I’d be very surprised.”

“The reality is that in an awful lot of schools driver education is happening already. Financial literacy is happening in an awful lot of schools already, and civics programmes are happening in an awful lot of schools already,” he said.

Labour are trying to force something on every school, which may not be appropriate. Schools can work out best what their students needs – not Labour. The core compulsory curriculum should be maths, english, science – not budgeting and driving.