Polly wanna cracker

By winged rodent 

Schools are raising more than 50% of their operating funds through the community at a time when families are struggling to afford basic groceries – yet Education Minister Chris Carter seems to believe their operations grants are adequate.

Carter failed to impress on Radio New Zealand’s Nine to Noon on Tuesday when he launched into a parrot impersonation, repeating figures and evading questions – much to the consternation of interviewer Kathryn Ryan.

Carter was called on to respond to concerns voiced by Northcote College principal Vickie Barrie and Papatoetoe High School principal and Secondary School Principals’ Association president Peter Gall. Both feel that schools, whatever their decile, simply cannot make ends meet with the current funds provided to them by the Government.

Barrie took the initiative of surveying a number of schools in her area and discovered that, at the extreme end, some were raising as much as 59% of their operating costs through sources outside of government funding. The average rate amongst those schools was 51%.

She cited the growing costs and expectations involved in keeping up with new technology, particularly ICT, and the hiring of extra support staff as major issues. The money schools were raising from the community was not going towards new buildings or teachers’ salaries, but on the costs of running everyday classes and programmes, and if this “unhealthy reliance on community funds” carried on she believed schools would be at risk of financial collapse.

The money that has been keeping the schools afloat has also been slowly ebbing away. Donations are voluntary and, with the rising costs of basic essentials hitting families, she has noticed these have been dropping off.

As schools scratch around to find the funds to provide the world class education expected of them, she has begun to wonder whether they are really state funded at all.

This problem is by no means decile specific. Barrie’s school, and those she interviewed, are high decile schools. They receive less funding from the Government but raise a large amount through overseas students – yet they are still struggling. She realises low decile schools need more support but believes the problem is affecting all schools, regardless of decile.

Papatoetoe High principal Peter Gall agrees. His school is a decile three, but he believes schools across the board are feeling the pinch. Schools have very high goals and expectations put on them when it comes to providing a quality education, but they need the funding to back them up. He too felt keeping up with technology and the need for extra support staff put the squeeze on schools. Papatoetoe School has 550 computers that are used by 1900 people and are serviced by one fulltime computer technician – it doesn’t take a genius to do the math on that one.

And our education minister’s response? – to crow, or perhaps squawk would be a better term, about the Government’s spending on education going up 80% with five billion extra dollars provided. A close ‘parrot watch’ of the interview showed the 80% line repeated six times and the five billion trotted out seven. This despite the fact that Ryan repeatedly reminded him that the 80% was for the education sector overall, that secondary schools’ share of the five billion was much less, and that schools’ operations grants had barely risen above inflation.

The “Polly wanna be re-elected” routine wore very thin very fast and caused Ryan to put Carter under enough pressure to get him to admit he believed operations funding levels were “adequate” for a school to provide a good basic education.

He did agree schools could “do more with more money” but felt money raised outside of the operations grant, through community funding and paying international students, was for ‘extras’ – which was the way it should be. Try telling that to the schools that are struggling to meet all the demands being made of them!

The best he could offer was a pacifier in the form of a vague and figureless muttering about extra funding for ICT in the budget.

We will continue to watch this space – but we do feel a Tui billboard coming on…