Regular visitors to my blog will know I am very critical of New Zealand's secondary education system of awarding qualifications. Known as NCEA, it is very flawed and ended up being a dog's breakfast of feelgood claptrap mixed with unicorn kisses and rainbow hugs.
Well, it is being scrapped, and not before time. This should have happened 20 years ago.
But, the devil is in the details as they say, and what replaces it really matters. What I expect will happen, is the system will be dumbed down even more. That's so that the government will be able to trumpet how they've restored things, while hiding they've actually got worse still. Basically, things have got so bad, that the system had to be scrapped as too many students were failing even basic literacy and numeracy assessments.
The government's plans to replace the NCEA system are on a tight timeline and will require a lot of support, say teachers.
After more than 20 years as New Zealand's official secondary-school qualification, the government has pulled the pin on the NCEA.
The National Certificate of Educational Achievement will be gone by 2030, replaced by a basic literacy and numeracy award at Year 11, and the Certificate of Education and Advanced Certificate of Education at Years 11 and 12.
'Achieved', 'not achieved', 'merit' and 'excellence' will be replaced by marks out of 100 and letter grades A, B, C, D and E.
The new certificates would be standards-based, like the NCEA is, meaning every student passes if they demonstrate the required knowledge or skills, but they would have to study at least five complete subjects and pass four of them to get their certificate.
This year's Year 8s would be the first cohort through the new system, starting with the foundation award in 2028, which might look a lot like the current NCEA literacy and numeracy tests.
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