Chief Executive's Foreword

Over the past few months controversy has raged in the education sector. Much criticism has been levelled at New Zealand Scholarship specifically, and to a lesser extent the overall NCEA system.

Despite the headlines, there have been strong messages of support for NCEA, for standards-based assessment and for the current direction that secondary education is being driven.

It is a shame that problems with Scholarship have spilled over into unwarranted criticism of NCEA, which is working well in the majority of schools. Teachers and principals have worked hard to ensure it was properly implemented and well managed, and many schools are very happy with what is now in place.

Take for example the profile in this issue of QA News of the Southland school, Aparima College. Here is an outstanding example of a school that has taken full advantage of the flexibility offered by NCEA. It is a small school with limited resources. NCEA, according to the Principal, has provided teaching and learning opportunities that the school could previously only dream about.

That is not to say the system is perfect. A report released from the PPTA on what teachers think of NCEA raised concerns in several areas. External assessment, moderation, resources, and communication were mentioned in the report and NZQA looks forward to working with the union to make improvements for teachers and students.

However, it was encouraging that the vast majority of teachers surveyed in the report believed that NCEA was better than the old system and were excited by the opportunities it offers for creative teaching.

Likewise, at the Secondary Principals' and Leaders' Forum in Wellington recently, members reiterated their commitment to standards-based assessment.

The Forum is jointly chaired by Secretary of Education Howard Fancy and me, and includes representatives from the PPTA, secondary principal associations, School Trustees Association, Independent Schools, Teacher Educators, the New Zealand Vice Chancellors Committee, Wharekura, and Deputy and Associate Principals.

The Forum acknowledged the positive benefits of NCEA, the broad support for it from the profession, learners, and communities, and the requirement that standards-based assessment be retained and further enhanced.

As usual NCEA has had the lion's-share of the limelight. However, there is other business going on in NZQA. This issue of QA News covers NZQA news that doesn't grab headlines in quite the same way, but is definitely worth mentioning.

A new quality assurance standard for Industry Training Organisations (ITOs) has been finalised. We have been delighted with the level of collaboration between ITOs and the NZQA consultative committee. The result has been a standard that really delivers what ITOs wanted to see. Read more about this on page 9.

You can catch up on some of the policy work we are doing around international education, which is an important component of NZQA's business, meet our new Chief Advisor Maori, Kara Cribb, and read about www.edCentre.govt.nz - a new internet portal that provides a single gateway to education information.

Regards

Karen Van Rooyen