Reflections by Phil Cullen who retired from his role as Director of Primary Education Queensland and who, since his retirement,
has fought the good fight to resist the neo-liberal GERM ( Global Education Reform Movement that has infected Australian Education.
Charles Philip [Phil] Cullen AM; A.Ed., B.Ed.[UQ], Dip.Ed.Edmin, M.Ed.Admin (Hons) [UNE]; FACE, FACEL, FQIEL, Gold Medal ACEL; Life Member: CCEA, QASSP, QSPSSA, QSSSA, Bris. SSRLA; Co-author: 4 books; Author 1 book; Former Q’ld Director of Primary Education; Chairman: Q’ld Day Comm, Primary Curric.Comm, Review Primary Educ’n in A.C.T. Gov’t Schools; Regional Director NQ & N.West Q’ld; Former member: Lismore Catholic Diocese Ed. Council, McAuley College [now ACU] Council, James Cook U of NQ Council , Townsville CAE Council. Primary School Teacher/Principal 23 years; Regional Director & Inspector 6 years; Director 13 years. (refer:’Who’s Who in Australia'.
May 17th 2017 In this final posting Phil, after a long battle , gives up the fight disappointed with the lack of resistance of Australian educators and with opposition politicians to present an alternative to the current managerial test oriented standards based approach.
New Zealand Leads the way
Phil has gained heart from the appointment of the new Labour Government led by Jacinda Adern with its return to a progressive approach to education.
New Zealand leads the way down under and maybe across the world in caring
about kids. Its determination to return to
sanity, humanity, progress,
initiative and competence for its schooling system, which itself determines
national progress in the long run, is now being unpacked and, I am told
that the new coalition government contains a few former teachers and active school parents as heavyweights who can talk school and lead the conversation for a better world down under.
.
There's dynamic
Tracey Martin,
former School Board chair;
Kelvin Davis, highly respected former principal and
Deputy Leader of the Labour Party; and
Winston Peters of NZ First and, Deputy
PM who trained as a teacher. In Australia we only have legal eagles.
 |
| Tracey Martin and Winston Peters |
Parent groups in NZ are claiming that now,
teaching will be returned to the teaching profession and democracy will be
returned to schooling in New Zealand soon. The isles are shaking with joy for
kids.
It's a country that has always been to the forefront of school improvement but
then, the take-over by the irrational managerialists and corporate
heavy-weights circa 1990, and the addition of GERM in 2008, has had a
detrimental impact that has lasted for a decade.
They've had enough, now. We
still tolerate it to our shame and academic deterioration.
How come New Zealand leads the world now in the
decontamination of the establishment's unworthy, useless, immoral,
unethical, unprofessional testucation procedures in schools? Well,
there's been a number of factors.
Fortunately, during this period, it has had its crusaders for kids who
just don't give in too easily. It's been a long and arduous battle, of
the kind that must continue next door, in Australia.
There's Kelvin Smythe, former Chief Inspector and
Allan Allach,
energetic, thoughtful former primary school principal, reader and writer and
Bruce Hammonds, former principal, consultant and writer - a valiant trio that
has been unafraid to have their say.
They set the pace.
( Phil maybe giving us more credit than we deserve but we have all done our best to share progressive ideas but we are happy to acknowledge there are many others who have made valuable contributions- Lester Flockton is one who comes to mind -Bruce Hammonds ).
 |
| Chris Hipkins |
There's Chris Hipkins, in particular, who has been the shadow
Minister for Education whose inspirational speeches and talks have been based
on a sound knowledge of schooling and who has been unequivocal in his aim to
rid the country of testucation and de facto schooling.
There's the
Primary Principals' Association which kept its
administrative distance from the government testucrats and compliant GERMans,
never properly complying . While "
The Government will never
listen and nothing will change and we are just one little country."
some timorous principals said, there were others of the association, especially
the leader of the organisation, Whetu Cormick, described as "The
greatest teacher organisation leader of our time,:" by Kelvin
Smythe. Whetu didn't hold back , "
At the other
 |
| Whetu Cormack |
extreme are
those like me," he said "
who will continue to fight to the
end. We know that National Standards and all the 'reforms' that go with them
are bad for our young people. Our young people have faith in us to protect
their futures by continuing to fight for the best education that our young
people deserve." Looking directly into the face of Nikki
Kay, the then Minister, he said,
"Let's wait no longer to get our young
people on the road to success. Let's put up a big stop to National Standards." The organsation has always been fearless...
http://www.nzpf.ac.nz/uploads/7/2/4/6/72461455/opinion_piece_nzpf_presidents_column_on_ns_may_31_2011_.pdf
There's Diane Kahn and
the
Save Our Schools organisation
whose prime target has always been
https://saveourschoolsnz.com/ ]
the elimination of 'national standards' and
was heavy and constant with dynamic opposition . [
There's an influential Kiwi sciolist [aka schooliolist -
one who pretends to be well informed about schooling] and academic testucator
who played a significant role in the introduction of testucation into
NZ.....who left the country at the right time.
( Just in case you can't guess who Phil is referring to it is John Hattie -Bruce Hammonds)
There are some messages for Australia.
In world schooling terms, it is
the boondocks of failed political schooling, the backward West Island of
learning progress, the most over-tested country in the world.
A political party needs to think. Does it believe in providing the
best schooling possible, or doesn't it give a damn as Aussie political
parties do?
 |
| Time to leave standardised learning Australia |
Listening to schooliolist academic know-alls, qualified testucators,
loud-mouth politicians, corporate unions inhabited
by conservative capitalists, neo-libs and delcons, which still rule the roost
on the west side of the ditch, continues to lead Australian schooling in the
wrong direction.
New Zealand has now told these cocky roosters what to do with
their distasteful attitude to children.
"Australian schools are in dire need of some Finnish-ing
tactics." said
Wendy Knight in
The Age....and we can now add:
'and some Kiwi tactics'. What really happens in a good school system?
Why
don't Australian politicians look around and learn?
An example of off-the-hip, loud-mouth political interference is contained in
suggestions made in
Treasurer Morrison's Shifting the Dial, another
imported kind of measurement.
It presume
s that
will improve
standards in schools.
It overlooks the reality that real teachers teach real
pupils....real people! The secret is in the interaction. They teach them
about
mathematics, to like mathematics. They don't get up in front of a class and
pontificate about what they themselves know.
Effective teachers of
anything operate from the learner's level. Socrates was a better teacher
of Maths than Einstein and a better teacher of literature than Shakespeare. His
pupils learned how to learn.
the hiring
of skilled subject specialists like mathematicians
Importance of Principal's organisations
A strong and outspoken principals' association can be truly influential as
they are in NZ.
Protection of children and their future as well as the
provision of a rich holistic curriculum, undaunted by fearful interruptions to
positive learning, should dominate the spirit of every principal's
personal professional code.
Laxity, timidity, compliance and silence have
no place in their organisations when the chips are down for kids....as they are
now in Australia.
Labour Party in Australia
 |
| What happened to Ned Kelly spitit? |
. The lib-lab neo-con conventions will
probably continue as they did in the passing of klein deforms
Neither political group, Labor nor Liberal, ever expresses any
thoughts about the continuance of the Klein system of schooling, now
almost a decade old ; and which should go because it is proving useless.
Neither party knows much about schooling and hides its ignorance by talking
only Gonksi and funding and teacher quality. For them, the plight of children
lies in the dollar sign, not in compassion and humanity and learning and in
experience and excellence. Each remains ultra-complacent by making do,
making silly schooling decisions, maintaining the mediocre, and supporting
private schools before helping public schools.
It's looking more evident every day that the lower half of the existing
Lib-Lab delcon group viz. Labor under Shorten, will be the government after the
next federal election in Australia
 |
| Joel Klein |
from Labor to
Liberal.
A country that treats its children the way that
Australia does, is in for big trouble....really big trouble. .
It relies on the cockeyed Gillard Theory of Testucation, using Kleinism to
control operatives and operations, to no end except to gather data; then
ignores the basic laws of administrative order and effectiveness and treats the electorate as if everyone is a
dill or doesn't care what happens to kids.
The present government will go while
it maintains these attitudes to schooling and doesn't have the capacity to
think. The Labor Party will replace it and not do any better. Both need
to think seriously about schooling...very, very seriously.
I'm deliberately apolitical and have voted informal at the last few federal
elections because I've been offered only lower-order policies in
general and crazy views about schooling. ...nothing that really suggests that
there is a healthy future for this wonderful country.
Schooling is the most important issue of this century
for Aussie citizens. If it is not rejuvenated, Australia has some big problems
coming up.
I'll vote for any party -Pauline's, Bob's, Nick's, Jacqui's,
anybody who says that it will get rid of NAPLAN. I'll know by its
standard of advocacy that such a party likes kids, that it is thinking and will
do something about our future. Our present klein system relies on child
abuse. I'll study the detail of course, but
no party can be so blithely
ignorant of schooling as our major parties are at present. Their mentors can
only bark Gonski, data, scores, testing, funding, teacher quality with
schooliolist pedantry and
no regard for the real spirit of learning at school.
Seriously - rejuvenation of schooling from the mess of mass testucation will
be very difficult. Unscrambling an egg always is. Since New Zealand will
have to do the job before Australia wakes up, it might be wise to locate some
observers there to learn how to go about it.
We need to do what New Zealand has done : Declare Ourselves
It's
rejuvenation time down under!
under
debate for some time. However, as educators, understanding how gifted students
learn in comparison to their peers is necessary for the success of their
learning experience and your ability to connect with them through teaching.’
schools should consider when incorporating
mixed reality technology into the classroom.’
rich) are advantaged and
thus prepared to continue the hegemony in the future. The extensive research
about the effects of poverty and socio-economic issues on learning shows that
the probability is that the children of the rich will 'achieve.' As in the
past, the system is designed to sift children into levels of 'achievement'. The
socio-economic influences will mean that the 'deserving' get a rich education,
while the rest just get the 3Rs. Workers in this model are seen as intelligent
machines, and, indeed, are replaced by machines as soon as possible. The
alternative, of course, is the New Zealand Curriculum.’
