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The news that dominated political debate and dinner talk in New Zealand last week started as a harmless press release issued out of nowhere.
On Wednesday August 26, in his role as associate finance minister, Green Party co-leader James Shaw announced that a plan to expand Oakura’s privately owned Green School would be “backed” with $ 11.7 million from the ready-to-go fund. the shovel to help the nation recover from Covid-19.
The work would help grow the list to 250, create 200 construction jobs, and inject millions of dollars annually into Taranaki’s broader economy, largely from families willing to pay between $ 16,000 and $ 43,000 a year for their children to attend. .
It was presented as an exciting development that would help ensure Taranaki’s future prosperity.
But the “good news story” lasted only hours before culminating in a public relations disaster and a key electoral issue that could spell the end of the Green Party’s time in Parliament.
READ MORE:
* The government’s $ 11.7 million Green School ‘never, never’ was a 100% grant, says CE
* James Shaw says he warned Green School and the Mayor of New Plymouth not to go to Crown for money
* Couple Who Supported Covid-19 Conspiracy Theories Hosted ‘Sacred Ceremony’ At Green School
ANDY JACKSON / THINGS
Marfell Community School Acting Principal Kealy Warren reads her open letter to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern about the Government’s $ 11.7 million funding for the Taranaki Green School.
“What happened, happened very quickly,” says the school’s executive director, Chris Edwards.
That is not an exaggeration.
Within hours of the funding announcement, there was a storm of outrage from teachers, principals, and politicians alike over how a project to make an elite school bigger and better, faced a lack of investment in classrooms with leaks and poor infrastructure in the state educational system.
Controversy and condemnation of the decision continued for days, leading to Shaw’s mea culpa on Tuesday, calling his decision to endorse the Green School project an “error in judgment.”
If that wasn’t irritating enough to Green School, its staff, and the school community, Shaw added that had his time been up, he would not have endorsed the request. He even claimed that he had tried to dissuade them from doing so.
At the time, the congratulations sent to the Green School immediately after the announcement were a distant memory as he tried to catch up and get his story heard.
As media scrutiny of the school was amplified, Edwards also had to explain why the school grounds had been used as the location for a “ceremony of abundance and rally at the lion’s door,” organized by the same couple from school who suggested the students could take a tour. from New Zealand and plant crystals, while calling Covid-19 a “manufactured natural disaster.”
Not only did this leave the school ducking for cover from comments it says it doesn’t endorse, it also left Shaw drenched in yet another wave of political taunting.
Over a week later, the school is shocked, bruised, and doing its best to pick up the pieces of its shattered reputation.
“We lost control of that story,” Edwards says. “It was announced and they ran with something else.”
That other thing is the fact that the requested funding was intended to be paid off largely as a loan, with only 25% as a grant.
It took days for the school to release that information, and when it did, the narrative of $ 12 million “free money” for an elite facility took hold.
ANDY JACKSON / THINGS
Rachel and Michael Perrett were inspired to build Green School New Zealand after their son’s life-changing educational experience at Green School in Bali.
The priority for Edwards now is the school’s relationships with the wider community.
“We have to reach out and we have to build bridges,” he says.
“I think a lot of people don’t understand who we are and that depends on us.”
He did not anticipate the level of “intensity” in terms of the response to ready-to-use financing.
Edwards says he fully appreciated how people would feel if they just read the headlines, but it was never the case that the school would get a lot of free money.
He also says that if there was any idea that the $ 11.7 million was being taken directly from budgets to fund state schools, he would have resigned.
“It would be immoral and wrong.”
It did not sit well with him that the policy announcements around investment in school infrastructure had coincided with the consequences related to the Green School situation.
“In no way would we have wanted that to be a process of cause and effect,” he says.
“I hope people now take a look at education and enlighten it.”
The backlash against the school has left them particularly raw, because the school has altruistic ambitions.
Andy Jackson / Stuff
Rachel and Michael Perrett, owners of the Green School in Oakura.
Founded by Michael and Rachel Perrett, who spent millions of their own money to build the first phase, their overall goal is to turn the school into something that benefits the world.
They passionately believe in him, having seen the difference he made in their son’s life. After failing in general education, he thrived in the hands-on, student-led, nature-centered environment at the Green School in Bali.
They want others to prosper too. While the school was established as a company and designed to generate income, its earnings were linked to expand the model and take it around the world.
The Perretts’ stated hope is that it will one day be freely accessible. But to do this they need to be successful in New Zealand.
A large part of the Taranaki Green School budget is income earned from international students, so the global Covid-19 pandemic and its impact on travel remains a challenge.
The $ 11.7 million is part of the answer to that challenge.
SIMON O’CONNOR / Things
Green School Chief Chris Edwards believes the challenges of the past week are “surmountable” as his community looks to the future.
The expansion will provide space for 250 students, but demand for venues and projected economic returns are based on half of its roll coming from abroad, Edwards says.
New Zealand’s border restrictions and various situations unfolding around the world make the future of travel uncertain, but they say that interest in the school remains high.
“Outside of New Zealand, the buzz about the Green School is encouraging,” says Edwards.
In October, the school will be one of 100 worldwide to be on display as part of the inaugural World Education Week.
SIMON O’CONNOR / Things
The Green School expansion should be completed next year.
Edwards says there is a kind of “schizophrenia” between Taranaki and New Zealand, and how the rest of the world views school.
“We are something very new.”
But despite being “kicked around in a very public way,” the school is determined to move forward positively.
“I think as a school, we are on the right side of history.”
As a privately managed entity, with a current roster of 60, it is developing its curriculum, which Edwards says will be “robust and challenging.”
“I think we are going to be the forefront of history and crystals are not part of that at all.”
Timeline:
26 of August
Associate Finance Minister James Shaw announces that the Green School will receive $ 11.7 million as part of the shovel-ready plan, funded with an infrastructure spending of $ 3 billion to help the country recover from Covid-19.
August 27th
Marfell Community School Acting Principal Kealy Warren writes a letter to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, calling Green School funding “a slap in the face.” A chorus of similar sentiments followed from other Taranaki directors.
Education Minister Chris Hipkins distances himself from the decision, saying it was pushed by Shaw. National Congresswoman and education spokesperson Nicola Willis called the move “rank hypocrisy.”
Members of the Green Party express concern that Shaw’s support was contrary to the party’s policy of not funding private schools and are demanding responses from his co-leader.
August 28
Warren, followed by 28 other principals in Taranaki, bills the government as a measure to get the same ratio per student that matches Green School funding. To date, the bills total $ 1.4 billion.
Shaw holds an evening meeting with party members and apologizes for “creating a mess” at the start of the election campaign. She also said that she would not have made the same decision if she had been given another chance.
Green School publicly confirms that the $ 11.7 million was not requested solely as a grant, but would also have a loan component.
August 31
National Party Leader Judith Collins visits New Plymouth, meets with Warren in a private meeting, and then announces a $ 4.8 billion plan to accelerate school repair and improve work across the country, should he be elected to government. .
September 1
Shaw publicly apologizes for his role in funding the Green School, calling it “an error in judgment.” However, he ruled out resigning.
September 3
The New Plymouth District Council states that its only link to the Green School project was as a regulator for building and resource consents. He was not a “financial partner” as Shaw wrongly claimed to members of the Green Party.
