Met with Stuart Middleton at the Manukau Institute of Technology today, the driver behind NZ’s first tertiary high school where students are simultaneously enrolled at school and MIT. The idea is that they transition from school, where most are about to leave anyway, and pick up a course at MIT. It’s a model that deserves copying.
Mainly because students can see some outcome of their learning – and therefore get really passionate about it – the Tertiary High boasts impressive success. Their latest results for NCEA Level 1 for Maori and Pasifika are below, and remember this is from a group that otherwise were on the path to dropping out of school.
Maori
Nationally – 60.8% at MIT – 80%
Pasifika
Nationally – 54% at MIT – 71%
Pretty good results. We have a 20% drop out rate in NZ - 20% of 16 year olds are no longer at school. The big factor, according to Stuart, seems to be that once kids drop out it’s really difficult to pick them up again. Instead if they move to some other learning, it doesn’t matter which so much, but one that gives a qualification, the chances are incredibly high that they go on to another qualification.
Not rocket science, perhaps, but a scheme that’s based on principles worth instituting into policy.
What a great initiative from Ann Tolley.
Cool idea David
If that’s come about because of Anne Tolley, I will review my impressions of her abilities, slightly..
Was it Ann Tolley or the institute itself that came up with it?
More to National’s Education policy than National Standards: http://www.3news.co.nz/Tolley-announces-first-tertiary-high-school/tabid/817/articleID/122616/Default.aspx
FYI David: It’s already Govt. policy.
@sbw
1.) It doesn’t appear to be connected in any way to National Standards which targets people beginning school not leaving it.
2.) Who’s idea was it? Who did the work to initiate it? When did work begin on it?
3.) This seems more like a trial run than actual policy. If it was policy I’d expect to see more than one such school and more than $1m spent on it.
MIT’s scheme has been around for a while – but great results all the same – but I was referring to the data on ensuring that kids continue in some form of study and the downside of that not happening.
So, when you say the MIT’s scheme has been around for a while, are you saying it was an initiative that began during the years of the Labour Government? So what role is Anne Tolley supposed to have played – if any?
Here is Stuart Middleton’s take on Tolley’s investment in secondary-tertiary:
The continuing support and increased funding for the Youth Guarantee is also worthy of wholesome praise. This government appears to understand something that continues to escape other governments in other countries and quite a number of researchers and educators: the issue with disengagement and educational failure can only be addressed by our working differently. Do the same and get the same. That is not only unpalatable from a social equity position but also a considerable risk from an economic point of view.
To support the new and growing focus on secondary / tertiary interface programmes such as trades academies and service academies and on pathways that have the potential to ease the passage of some students away from possible and perhaps probable failure to success seems to me to be a good investment which will avoid continued waste of resources (cash and human) and teacher effort not to mention the downstream costs of social dysfunction and dislocation.
http://www.stuartmiddleton.co.nz/?p=862
No Anne you can’t spin this as you normally try to do. Tolley announced funding for this in 2009.
Wrong David Shearer, the MIT Tertiary High School hasn’t been around for a while. You might have missed Tolley’s press release from September 2009:
This was a Tolley initiative. It is great that Labour is finally acknowledging the good work that Tolley is doing in the schools sector. What a breath of fresh air you are to your portfolio, David Shearer, wanting to be constructive about education issues rather than just being a pathetic, destructive labour spokesperson for the PPTA and NZEI.
Nice to see Labour officials supporting a fantastic idea by the National Government – and good policy. Congratulations to Anne Tolley. Credit where credit is due.
@Draco – no matter how you try to shoot this idea down, its a good one and a success, your post sounds like you’re desperately trying to pin the credit on someone else? How remarkably obtuse and spiteful.
Blair’s note is spot on. And, yes, full marks for the government getting behind MIT and their initiative – it was enabled in I think Edn Amendment Bill No. 2 as well that we supported – and now is being picked up by other polytechnics. Good stuff. But the real challenge that I was highlighting is to ensure that young people leave school to something and not just dropping out. We are still left with 77,000 young people not in work or learning.
I don’t know where you got your figures from David, but that sounds like a very high number. Do you think the Youth Guarantee is a good idea, guaranteeing that all school leavers go into work or training?
My genuine and ‘unspinned’ question was directed to David Shearer not you Portion Control. I don’t know why Red Alert moderators let you lot get away with some of your comments. Except of course it does provide an insight into the current mindsets of the professional right wing trollers.
As for your inference that David Shearer was also attempting some sort of spin… quite the reverse. He was expressing his admiration and support for the project initiated by Stuart Middleton. By the way, the fact that Anne Tolley announced funds in Sept. 2009 suggests the scheme was actually getting up and running well before then. That means it has been around for a while.
I suspect the problem is you are quite young and havn’t been around for long. You may correct me if I’m wrong
.
@Anne, I don’t know why you’re getting all twisted about this. Provide evidence that Labour initiated this then your comments will have validity. As there is none and it is a National Govt initiative, speaks volumes for your lack of grace and tolerance for other views. Success is success, do you really have to colour it red out of spite?
I submitted my last comment before seeing David Shearer’s
response. Thanks for clearing up the confusion David.
No Lou Peters I wasn’t trying to suggest was necessarily a Labour initiative.
No Lou Peters. I asked David Shearer ‘did the initiation begin during Labour’s term of office?’. Bit of a leap to suggest I was claiming that it was..
so tolley jumps on a bandwagon again, and the trolls laud her as the originator of good ideas. i can tell you from personal experience that this particular idea had it’s genisis long before tolley had even been informed that she had been pinged to do the education job.
the act of handing over money for an initiative already underway is an old nat trick, designed to give the impression of oversight and control. just another illusion, supported utterly by the fourth column.
what a desperate situation this country is headed for if this kind of intellectual theft is deemed acceptable, as long as it’s the nats doing it.
give it five more years of this, and we will all be shaking our heads in sorrow, from across the tasman.
1130am was supposed to be deleted. Didn’t work.
Thanks bbfloyd, evidence that Labour started this? None ? Godd. Unless you beleive David is somehow wtrong in his assertion. As far as “this kind of intellectual theft” what theft and who is responsible? Please provide references and evidence. What planet are you from? Paranoia like this needs professional mitigation.
@Anne – I think you can only ask for stuff to be deleted.
Who cares where the idea came from David makes an excellent and valid point without resorting to partisan politics.
I’m not trying to shoot it down and I agree that it was a good idea. I’m trying to find out who’s idea it was. You can’t just say it was a Tolley initiative just because she announced the funding.
But is it a National Government initiative or a Teacher Union initiative? That’s what we’re trying to find out. Who’s idea it is and how long it’s been worked on.
The people who want to ensure that the idea is attributed to right people rather than having someone else claim it as their own or even having it portrayed as their own in the MSM. You know, the people who don’t like IP theft.
Thanks for clarifying that Spud. Sometimes while you are typing up a comment the post’s author (or someone) submits a comment which makes your own redundant. You know what I mean
.
Labour had an initiative called something like Schools Plus that was starting something similar. (I remember because I was involved in some consumer discussions about how it could include disabled students).The Minister at the time would remember the details but it was about making polytech education or technical courses more accessible to school aged students. Labour also extended the Gateway Scheme to all schools which was a programme whereby students could attend polytechs and school at the same time, and do work placements. Stuart Middleton is one person who has been asking for this for years (by the way the success of this particular scheme is largely due to the Middleton enthusiasm as he is a very dynamic educationalist).
@Anne and Draco T Bastard: “first” tertiary high school = new initiative by the National Govt.
@Anne – Yeah.
Though that doesn’t bother me as much as when I comment on another’s comment and then somebody displaces my comment so it looks like I was agreeing with a different person. 
It usually happens when a comment gets freed.
Hey, sbw, did you read what Hilary said? Seems that we should be thanking Stuart Middleton for pushing the idea itself and, possibly, the previous government for getting the ball rolling. The present NAct government seems to be just claiming the accolades for someone else’s work because they signed the check.
@lou…. you need to get a better understanding of the meaning of the word paranoia. better that than hoisting yourself by your own petard.
btw… attempts at fisking won’t ever work with me. i wrote an opinion, not an article.
Is the message here really that state secondary schools need to be more like MIT? Can they be? How do resource levels compare? That is my first reaction – are we comparing like with like?
Also, are we confident that MIT is getting the REALLY hard cases? For this to work, you need to have logistics in place which usually means strong family commitment.
I know of one student who made this kind of transition because he preferred the MIT environment – but he would have been OK at school too. I might add that he was able to focus on a smaller number of subjects that he really liked – not sure that this is great for his longer term prospects.
So there is another question – how many subjects were these MIT students taking, on average? What kind of subjects – Physics, Foreign languages? Also how heavily slanted to Unit Standards?