Covid 19 coronavirus: South Auckland principals want to cancel NCEA exams for Auckland students this year

Some South Auckland principals want to cancel this year’s external exams for Auckland students because many are staying home to “choose life over education.”

Even now that Auckland’s Level 3 lockdown has ended, some schools still have only a third of their students back in class due to community fear of Covid-19, which this time has mainly affected Pasifika and Maori families. .

The time to catch up is quickly running out with the school holidays beginning on September 25 and the National Certificates of Educational Achievement (NCEA) external exams beginning on November 16.

Sir Edmund Hillary Collegiate principal Kiri Turketo, who has seen attendance at his high school grow from just 28 percent on Monday to 30 percent on Wednesday, said the outlook for his NCEA students was “dire.”

“They are choosing life over education,” he said.

He said South Auckland principals asked ministers and government officials at a Zoom meeting during the shutdown to allow schools to rate all students for the NCEA this year based on their previous work, rather than the usual external examinations. .

“We’re all saying why can’t it be left to the teacher’s judgment based on the derived grades?” she said.

He said the New Zealand Grading Authority told Auckland schools on August 24 that they could turn in this year’s Common Assessment Mathematics Assignments (MCAT) for derived grades if their students weren’t ready for the MCAT exams on September 15 and 17.

The agency said: “When a school or kura has been operating under level 3 alert conditions during period 3, but has moved to level 2 prior to the MCAT, and students have had the appropriate opportunity to prepare for the assessment, the Schools must make every reasonable effort to deliver the MCAT as planned.

“In circumstances where it would not be reasonable to proceed, or when the school determines that it would not be reasonable to expect some or all of its students to be ready for evaluation, it must use its missed evaluation policy to determine a valid grade for any student who does not present the MCAT “.

Turketo commented, “If they can do that for MCAT, why can’t they do that for NCEA?”

Howick College Principal Iva Ropati, which has more than 90 percent of its students returning, said that proceeding with external examinations would be “terribly unfair” for Auckland students who have missed nearly nine weeks of school this year, in compared to six weeks in other regions. .

“I would like the derived scores to be considered without external examinations,” he said.

“Just do what the kids have done for your programs to date and let us as teachers decide what judgment might be for your achievement, knowing that a good deal of time has been wasted, particularly for Auckland students, actually just for Auckland students. “

However, the majority of directors in the Auckland region do not support the call. Auckland Secondary School Principals Association President Steve Hargreaves requested four additional credits from the NCEA for Auckland students, but said the exams should continue.

“I think it’s important that we show up for the exams,” he said.

“The UK was in chaos with the widespread use of derived grades. The NCEA exams are two and a half months after our return to school, which is enough time to focus on the essential course content and prepare for the exams. .

“If we were to use derived grades, we would have to generate evidence of student performance, which is probably a test anyway.”

Hargreaves’ school, Macleans College, reports attendance now “well into the nineties.”

Aorere College principal Greg Pierce, whose attendance is still only around 50 percent, said eliminating outsiders had some support, but Auckland schools as a whole were diverse and many schools would want to keep them.

De La Salle College principal Myles Hogarty, who has 95 percent of his students back, said his staff would offer additional tutoring and class time over the holidays to prepare students for exams.

“We are preparing our boys to take external exams,” he said.

Turketo said his staff had proposed using one week of school holidays to continue classes for all students who want to attend voluntarily.

“The staff said, why don’t we work for a week, we have it as week 11? [of this term]? I have to admit that I shed a tear, I was very proud, “she said.

“I know we have the support of the board, I know we have the support of the teachers. The question I have to be realistic about is that we are already in week 7 and I only have 28 percent of the children.”

A spokeswoman for Education Minister Chris Hipkins said Hipkins was “looking into whether more support is needed” for Auckland’s NCEA students.