ON THE OUTSIDE LOOKING IN: THE CREATIVE UNIVERSITY AND ITS POOR RELATION, PRIVATE TRAINING ESTABLISHMENTS - Brill
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M. J. STUART
8. ON THE OUTSIDE LOOKING IN: THE CREATIVE
UNIVERSITY AND ITS POOR RELATION, PRIVATE
TRAINING ESTABLISHMENTS
INTRODUCTION
In this chapter I set the context of education within the field of neo-liberal economics,
before looking specifically at the issue of initial teacher education, and of Early
Childhood Education (ECE) credentials within this wider field. In New Zealand,
since the 1980s, education has been viewed as a market (as a place for competitive
engagement for private profit) as part of a wider field of neo-liberal economics.
Since the turn of the twentieth century successive governments wishing to grow
the national wealth, have adopted the economic concept of Human Capital Theory
(HCT). I examine the influence of HCT on ECE, and the position of initial teacher
education providers in the education market.
New Public Management ideas, such as Public Choice and Human Capital theories,
underpinned the New Zealand 1989 Education Act, which set out the roles and
responsibilities of ECE centres, schools as well as tertiary education (see e.g. Devine,
2000). Choice is a central pillar in the perception that educational institutions are
‘firms’ competing with each other in the education environment as a ‘marketplace’;
while parents and students are their ‘clients’. A tenet of neoliberal economics is
the concept of the self-maximising entrepreneur who orders preferences to establish
the best cost-benefit for his or her educational dollar. Students seeking vocational
qualifications are able to choose the tertiary institution that best meets their needs.
Parents exercising choice, have a variety of ECE centres and schools from which
to choose. The competitive employment marketplace, economists argue, creates
the demand for skills, competencies and tradable knowledge. Belief in credentials
underpins both the neoliberal economic discourse of ‘choice’ in ‘employment
markets’ and the commodification of knowledge. As education is a ‘private’ good,
the qualification gained can be traded by the individual like any other goods and
services, for the best value for investment. Those holding a teaching qualification are
in demand by ECE management and employers.
Credentials have long been considered by the state to be a central issue of
professionalism for teachers in ECE. The Report of the Consultative Committee on
Pre-school Educational Services (Bailey, 1947) recommended that the state fund
kindergartens, differentially from the only other recognised option at that time,
T. Besley & M. A. Peters (Eds.), Re-imagining the Creative University for the 21st Century, 111–122.
© 2013 Sense Publishers. All rights reserved.
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playcentres. The first gained state subsidised teacher-training; unlike the second - a
voluntary parent co-operative. Thirty years later, there were calls (internationally,
as well as nationally) to recognise working women’s needs for childcare. While
the poor, and the working class had always worked, and used a range of informal
care for their young children (Julian, 1977), such norms had not been accepted by
middle-class women. However, the Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Pre-
school Education (Hill, 1971) considering the case of preschool, including day-
care, recommended maintaining only the two sessional options of kindergartens
and playcentres. The kindergarten associations maintained control of a two-year
kindergarten teacher training qualification until 1975, until they were moved into the
Colleges of Education. At this time they also offered a one year childcare workers’
qualification (Tarr, 2006, p. 26). ECE was still largely seen by society as an extension
of the maternal home, rather than a service for working parents. However, there
was some movement to recognise that the sessional options did not meet everyone’s
needs. Economist Bill Sutch (1974) suggested that the 1971 Hill Report had avoided
making tackling the issue of childcare for working women (pp. 149–155), and noted
approvingly the 1972 Labour Party policy for ‘child care schemes’ (p. 154). Peter
Dinniss (1974), an ECE academic, suggested as that kindergarten teachers’ roles had
changed to include the functions of parent education as well as teaching children,
a new definition of the term ‘professional’ was needed. Such a definition, Dinniss
suggested, should involve ‘the consumer’s or client’s opportunity to select for himself
(sic) the professional from whom he requires service’ (p. 16). There was emerging, a
discourse associating the understanding of professionalism with credentials.
Within a decade, such terms as ‘consumer’ or ‘client’ were to gain an economic
valorisation, perhaps unforeseen by Dinniss. Increasingly, the role of working mothers
was couched in terms of ‘choice’ and ‘self-actualisation’; there was, some believed
a ’right’ for women to work (e.g. Sutch, 1974). An international publication Early
Childhood Care and Education report (OECD, 1977) summarised this emerging debate,
noting that working women brought benefits to both themselves and wider society.
This OECD report couched its findings in terms of ‘choice’, ‘client’ and ‘consumer’
but also in terms of ‘supply and demand’ (p. 9). Economic terms such as ‘cost-benefit’
were, in the next decade, increasingly evident in international and state publications.
The language of economics entered education in New Zealand at a very specific
time: a period some viewed as a rupture in educational discourse (e.g. see Devine,
2000; Stuart, 2011). With the adoption of the view of education as an economic
benefit, education was redefined as a private value to the individual, rather than
as a public value to the state. This paper follows the penetration of such ideas into
the realm of ECE. The adoption of neoliberal ideas from the Chicago School of
Economics (by firstly New Zealand Treasury, and secondly by the Fourth Labour
Government) has been set out by others (Fitzsimmons & Peters, 1994, Boston, 1997,
Devine, 2000; Olssen, 2001; Olssen et al, 2004: Findsen, 2004). A central thesis
of neoliberal economics is the withdrawal of government from any direct interest
or active management of education bodies. Education institutions, set up under the
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Education Act, 1989, all are self-governing, and are expected to be ‘responsive to
consumer needs’ (Department of Education, 1988a, p. 6).1 ECE charters bind them to
a number of accountability measures (Boston, 1997), in return for which they receive
a bulk funding grant from government. The policy documents which underpinned
the ECE section of the Education Act, 1989 were Education to be More (Department
of Education, 1988a) and Before Five (Department of Education, 1998b), where the
government’s responsibility for policy, partial funding and training of ECE teachers
was detailed. Prime Minister David Lange, who also held the portfolio of Education,
noted the need for trained ECE teachers: so that the sector would have ‘equal status’
with other education sectors’ (1988b, p. 2). In 1988 the Colleges of Education began
offering a three year kindergarten training qualification (Tarr, 2006, p. 27).
There was debate about whether educational institutions could determine
their own definition of ‘quality’2, or whether, as the Scott Report, published by
the Department suggested, there should be a ‘discourse of accountability ‘(Scott,
1986, cited in Shaw, et al, 2006), and a determination of teaching quality through
criteria and assessment procedures. This ‘accountability’ model was adopted by
the Fourth Labour Government. Colleges of Education3, too, lost their monopoly
on teacher training under the 1989 Act (section 18), which set up Private Training
Establishments (PTEs), and by the twenty-first century initial ECE teacher training
was offered by both polytechnics and PTEs.4
Competition in the marketplace is presented as a tenet of quality assurance,
where the education customers choose the tertiary provider who can confer the
most marketable qualification. The Equivalent Full-time Student Funding (EFTS)
mechanism supports competition, as tertiary funding follows the student. ITE
institutions compete to attract both the student fees and associated EFTS funding.
All are seen as equal in the marketplace, thus associated resources such as land and
buildings are not factored in. In effect a two-tier system evolved. Universities were
beneficiaries of establishment grants before 1989: they had land, buildings, established
faculties and a range of resources. Universities mounted a strategic initiative to retain
their right to offer degrees, their academic freedom, their right of tenured positions,
and their research focus. They and polytechnics, set up before the education reforms,
had been established by the Crown which at that time viewed education as a state
responsibility, a public good. Other providers setting up in the tertiary field after
1989 did not get establishment funding.5 The Tertiary Education Commission was
established in 2001 to audit the non-University tertiary sector for quality assurance.
Private Training Establishments have only people assets, as many operate
from leased buildings, and have smaller resources, such as libraries stocked with
vocational materials. They lack the gravitas of academia, despite the requirement of
the Education Act 1989 (Section 261. 9), for any institution accredited to be taught
‘mainly by people engaged in research‘. While accreditation for ITE requires that the
staff be research active, many PTEs lack the informal mentoring academic support
available to staff in universities (Rivers, 2006, pp. 22–4).6 Training of teachers has
traditionally been a blend of studies of education, curriculum areas and initiation into
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the profession (Findsen, 2004, p. 62; Kane, 2005, p. 91). With the adoption of ITE
programmes by PTEs at the turn of the twenty-first century, the emphasis has often
been on the latter two aspects: what Findsen calls a ‘drift’ towards work patterns
‘where the norms and values are reflective of business and industry’(p. 64). PTEs and
ITEs are seen as offering vocational training, offering skills and knowledge required
by employers. ECE centres and their managers are often referred to in these circles
as the ‘industry’, with an onus on the ITE to be responsive to industry requirements.
There was a shift in the focus of government policy at the turn of the twentieth
century, as increasingly governments sought to ensure ‘quality’ (1988a, p. 7). While
Public Choice was an accepted tenet, the incoming 1999 Labour government adopted
a second neoliberal idea – that of Human Capital Theory (HCT). Agencies such as
the OECD and World Bank had accepted many of the Chicago School’s ideas that
educational benefits could accrue to the individual, and the family. The aggregated
benefits could also assist the geographic or cultural community and add to the
national wealth, theorists such as Gary Becker believed. Training in knowledge and
skills were presented as investments: the responsibility of first the school, and second
the individual’s employer. Becker and the early HC theorists (e.g. Shultz, Denison,
Barro and Mincer) had focused on national benefits from investing in education
and training. Becker believed that the family (seen as a ‘firm’) had the economic
interests of its members at heart. Women, Becker argued, could invest firstly in the
skills of their young children, while working in the home. However, they could, once
they returned to paid work, also contribute to the national wealth. Childcare became
a policy of governments keen to support women to return to the workforce. Working
parents needed to be reassured about the quality teachers’ qualifications before
entrusting their children to their care. Thus governments in New Zealand sought to
ensure quality through regulatory and assurance mechanisms such as approval of
teacher education qualifications and accredited training providers.
The role of teachers was fore-grounded during the NZ Fifth Labour Government’s
(1999–2008) term, while the role of parents in ECE receded. Under this government
the function of ECE teaching, became tied to the notion of ‘quality’, including that
of teacher credentials. The powers of New Zealand Teachers Council (NZTC) 7
were enhanced to establish, maintain, approve and monitor initial teacher education
(ITE) programmes (Lind & Wansbrough, 2009). 8 There were, in 2005, twenty ITEs
offering an ECE qualification, mostly at a diploma level (Kane, 2005, p. xiii), nine
of which were PTEs (Kane, 2005, p. 2). This was a very different picture from the
training of primary and secondary teachers, where, in 2006, over ninety percent were
trained in schools of educations attached to universities. Even their status appeared
to be confusing, for example, the Rivers’ review noted that one national training
provider, Te Tari Puna Ora o Aotearoa NZ Childcare Association, was a PTE. It was
in fact, at that time, an OTEP (Other Tertiary Education Provider) (Rivers, 2006,
p. 7, footnote 2).
Underlying the move to improve credentials was new international research.
Early Childhood Education became a focus of later HC Theorists because it had
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demonstrated long-run economic benefits. Investment in ECE, micro-ecomometrician
James Heckman argued, was an efficient state investment: investing early was a
better option than investing in older age-groups. Heckman drew on data from the
Abacederian, Chicago Schools, Headstart and Highscope-Ypsalanti studies: young
disadvantaged children were proven to make progress when enrolled in ECE services
with enriched environments. Not only did the children make good initial progress,
but Heckman and others believed, their progress continued into later life. ECE paid
dividends, because while the mother worked, her child gained the dispositions and
skills required of future employees. Children from the studies were shown to be
more successful in seeking employment, with reduced chances of being incarcerated
as adults. Supra-national agencies such as the World Bank and the OECD adopted
Heckman’s ideas, within their wider economic advice, in the early twenty-first
century. Publications such as Starting Strong iii (OECD, 2012) suggests that ECE
‘empowers disadvantaged families to cope with their specific poverty-related
problems’ (Van Tuiji & Lessman, Weiss et al,2008, cited in OECD, 2012, p. 222).
In New Zealand the Fifth Labour Government (FLG) adopted HCT tenets as an
underpinning of their education policy, following advice couched in Human Capital
terms from Treasury (2002a, b). The FLG’s policy document A Strategic Plan
for Early Childhood Education (Ministry of Education, 2002) (SPECE) aimed at
improving quality of ECE and supporting more mothers back into the workforce
(Laugusen, 2005). SPECE (MoE, 2002) set out a vision tied to growing the
individuals’ skills and the nation’s wealth.
The early years of a child’s learning make a significant difference to the way
they develop and go on to learn throughout their lives. Getting it right at this
vital stage will build the lifelong foundations of success, not only for our
children, but also for New Zealand … Our social, educational and economic
health can only benefit from efforts and resources focused on young New
Zealanders. We cannot leave to chance the quality and accessibility of early
childhood education. (Mallard, Foreword, MoE, 2002)
The children of Māori and Pasifika communities were of special concern to the
FLG. Such children were, SPECE stated, under-represented in their participation
in ECE. The government aimed to increase the teacher-supply of members of these
two communities. It was, SPECE suggested, the responsibility of ITE providers,
to foster an understanding of Māori and Pasifika children. Meanwhile, the cultural
communities should take responsibility for encouraging parents to enrol their
children in an ECE centre (MoE, 2002, p. 7).
With the notion that parents should be in paid work, their role became one of
a subsidiary to qualified teachers. If parents are to be encouraged to leave their
children with others, then, policy-makers argued, the issue of teacher supply was
a vital consideration. The baseline qualification for such staff was to be a (NZQA
framework) level seven Diploma or Degree and increased numbers of qualified,
registered ECE teachers (MoE, 2002, pp. 2; 13). Training incentive grants, special
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scholarships, and mentoring programmes for teacher registration were specifically
mentioned. Te Puni Kōkori (2001) and the Education Review Office (2002) both
undertook reviews of ITE training under this government, as well as an inquiry
by the Education and Science Select Committee (Cameron & Baker, p. 22).
A combined Ministry of Education and Teachers Council review found that Initial
Teacher Education ‘had suffered from low status and has been an on going target of
critique’ within the tertiary world (Cameron and Baker, 2004, p. 13). Many felt that
an emphasis on a philosophy of education, with a sound pedagogical underpinning
was lacking (p. 13). Rather, there was a narrow technicist focus on teaching on
competencies and standards’ (p. 14). The conclusion from Cameron and Baker’s
literature review was that there was little research to underpin the profession.
The Cameron and Baker 2004 review looked at, among other things, the issue of
research funding – a government funding mechanism, independent of bulk-funding,
tied to research outputs. The FLG introduced the Performance Based Research Fund
(PBRF) (a peer-review of research publications) that year, to encourage an active
research role by all tertiary providers. Most of this funding was captured by the
universities, who also happened to be successful in contracting for other government
and private funding. This also applied to teacher education programmes – most of the
funding went to Schools of Educations attached to Universities. ITEs in Polytechnics
gained some PBRF funding however, there is no requirement or attempts by PTEs to
enter the contestable research fields. Indeed, the application of PBRF to the Teacher
Education field was vigorously debated (e.g. Findsen, 2004; Jesson & Smith, 2006;
Alcorn, 2009), with some asking what type of research was most applicable to an
applied programme. There appeared to be no clear consensus on the role of ITEs, in
fact, Cameron and Baker, concluded the research was inconclusive.
The role of normative expectations is currently problematic both within and
without ITE sectors (see e.g., O’Neill, et al, 2009, p. 592), with the requirement
that lecturers delivering degrees be competent at both teaching and researching.
Outside universities, it is difficult for non-university staff to attend conferences,
publish papers and in order to demonstrate that they are ‘research active. For
example, many research conferences are held at the conclusion of the university
teaching semester, which may not equate to those of other ITE programmes. For
PTEs who have not opted into PBRF funding rounds, it is challenging to both deliver
contracted outcomes and demonstrate that they are research active. It is an example
of Government’s ‘steering from a distance’ (Marginson, 2005, p. 5).
The call to increased professionalism has attracted discussion about the role of
‘leadership’ among ECE professionals. Agencies such as NZTC and the Ministry
of Education have sought publications on the topic (e.g., Thorndon et al, 2009),
suggesting that ECE lacks strong leadership models especially in the teacher-led
sectors. The discourse of leadership, too, entered the education field at the time
of devolved responsibility to education agencies under the Education Act, 1989,
suggesting that leaders needed to be more than merely adroit managers (NZTC).
For Teacher Registration purposes NZTC requires ‘professional leaders’ to mentor
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provisionally registered teachers to full registration. Unlike the many leadership
publications setting out leadership in the school sector, it was not until twenty years
later that the FLG’s Strategic Plan 2002–12 sought to enhance ECE leadership
through professional development (2002).
In the past decade, there has been a shift, partly facilitated by the FLG’s adoption
of HC theories, to an enhanced credentialism for ECE teachers. This shift is also
evident in the policies of the National Coalition Government (2008–11). Many ITE
training providers offer a degree, rather the baseline Diploma of Teaching ECE
(Kane, 2005). The market continues to determine the need. During the period of
FLG the competitive environment of job-seeking student EFTs was enhanced (Kane,
2005). Skills, it seemed are in demand, across the sectors. The ECE Taskforce (2011),
the National Government’s (2008–11) policy advisory group, noted that there was a
call for the removal of ‘the cap from teacher education courses’ (p. 199) so that more
teachers could be trained.9 Teachers in teacher-led ECE services, it is believed can
support ‘[p]arental engagement in paid work [which] delivers many short- and long-
term benefits to individuals, their children, society and the economy … New Zealand
women aged 25–34 years have a low rate of participation in the labour market’ (ECE
Taskforce, 2011, p. 122). Women, the ECE taskforce stated, citing NZ Treasury, NZ
Women’s Affairs and NZ Department of Labour, needed to stay ‘well-connected’ to
the workforce (p. 130). While the mother is seen as ‘in need’ of work, the ECE teacher
is being portrayed as interventionists with responsibility for the hard-to-educate.
Increasingly there are calls to ensure the poor participation of ‘risky’ populations
(those with intergenerational poverty) is mitigated by early intervention. ‘The
qualifications, education and training of ECE staff are … an important policy issue’
(OECD, 2006, cited in OECD, 2012, p. 144) which, should, the OECD states, choose
not to invest in such credentials, could affect ‘child development outcomes’ (p. 145).
The state has increased interest in managing parents of ‘dysfunctional families’,
through early intervention and participation in ECE. Such management is an
example of bio-political governmentality (Foucault, 2008). Qualified ECE teachers,
operating in enriched education environments are seen, in such a discourse, as able
to address risks: through caring for children of working parents while enhancing
the skill level of their children. Numerous policy documents cite research by
Heckman and his economic colleagues, as his views on the value of early education
have become a truth in supporting Human Capital (e.g., NZ Treasury, 2002a& b;
2008). ‘Children need the opportunity to participate in high-quality early childhood
education’, NZ Treasury (2012, p. 8) noted in its 2012 Vote Education appropriations.
Despite the rhetoric about credential ensuring professionalism, increasingly teachers
have responsibility for remediating ‘children in disadvantaged environments’ (NZ
Treasury, 2008, p. 25). State-supported ECE is a ‘cost-benefit’ investment and
viewed by economists as the best way to reduce the tail of disadvantage (p. 26).
The National Coalition Government has introduced a ‘Targeted Assistance for
Participation’ Programme to support increased ECE attendance in communities
where it is low (Parata, 19 June, 2012).
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Efficient state investment is viewed as offering targeted investments to ameliorate
such risks in a tight economic environment. Education continues to be seen as a
private good, for which either individuals themselves, or employers must pay, but
where some need initial support, to mitigate societal risks. With a perceived need
to support women from the target groups into paid employment, there has been an
increased call for ITE providers to attract students from these groups. There are
statements such as ‘Māori teachers are now in real demand … young Māori need
Māori role models to teach and guide them’ (TeachNZ) to be found on a number of
Crown agency sites (e. g. ECE Taskforce, 2011). The need to close the gap in Māori
achievement has been a constant focus of current Minister of Education, Hekia
Parata’s speeches (e.g. May, 25, 2012; June, 19, 2012).
ECE is increasingly presented in economic terms, as ‘being the best investment a
nation can make’ (ECE Taskforce, 2011, p. 16), for both individuals, their families,
employers as well as the country. Recent NZ government ECE policy documents
cite James Heckman, noting his findings that ‘investments in early childhood
education lay effective foundations on which children can subsequently build stable
knowledge and skill frameworks’ (ECE Taskforce, 2011, p. 22). Parents are exhorted
to consider work as a career and to ‘avoid … long gaps in their participation in the paid
workforce’. They are encouraged to view ‘high-quality early childhood education as
an investment in their children’s future … [being] prepared to pay a proportion of
the costs of the services they use’ (ECE Taskforce, 2011, p. 15). Training, curricula
and teaching are likewise seen in cost-benefit terms, with ‘spillover effects’ (p. 21).
Highly qualified teachers, the report concluded, can support state funding by offering
‘massive returns on investment’ (ECE Taskforce, 2011, p. 21).
Those investments help children grow to reach their full potential in society, in
education and well beyond. Subsequently, they go on to have healthy and productive
lives. Participation in high-quality early childhood education can make the difference
between having a life of poverty and dependence or a life characterised by on-going
self-development and positive social engagement (ECE Taskforce, 2011, p. 13).
The ‘will to knowledge’ (savoir) (Foucault, 1994, p. 387) of the discourse of HCT
in educational policy has been interrogated for its attempts to offer the universal
panacea of ECE as a solution to poverty. Genealogy assisted the unmasking of the
science of credentialism, to question the role of the teacher in enriching the children
of the poor. It invited skepticism about the role of PTE in the employment discourse
that constructs teachers as expert leaders; parents as workers; and their children as
in need of specialist tuition. The role of universities, offering research options to the
elite, has been created by a policy environment that seeks vocational outcomes for
all but a few. When the government states it wishes to ensure that the tertiary system
‘achieves the best return on public investment’ (Tertiary Strategy 2010, p. 10) by
improving completion course and qualification rates, it puts faith in the efficacy of
HCT. Implicit in this model is the assumption of unlimited growth in employment,
and competitive advantage for the fittest. Yet, as Zygmunt Bauman (1998, p. 123)
argues, globalisation affects us all in different ways – tends to ‘strike at the “bottom”
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of society’, where the effects foster inclusion or exclusion of those found to be
intractable. When HCT is offered as a uni-focal solution to growing national wealth,
teachers, parents and children are governed by the discourse.
CONCLUSION
After two decades of state investment in education, there are new international
perceptions of parents, teachers and children. Policy now places the onus for
efficiency-focused outcomes on teachers who are increasingly presented as
‘saviours’ of the poor and dysfunctional. They are required to be ‘leaders’ (Parata,
2012; Thorndon et al, 2009), able to solve professional and pedagogical problems.
Their role in ‘growing the development’ of young children, has been supported
by neurobiological research into children’s brain-development, which gives them
a ‘head start’ (OECD, 2012, p. 149). Supra-national advice is that ECE staff
qualifications need to be enhanced in order to improve ‘better child outcomes’ (p. 11)
– from falling ‘further behind’ (p. 284). Policy advice from the OECD suggests
that countries could revise their Initial Teacher Education programmes, which can
support ‘labour mobility’ both within and across national borders (OECD, 2012).
New Zealand’s benchmark qualification of the Diploma of Education (ECE) is
offered as an example of good policy strategy (pp. 184–5).
Using data from America micro-economic studies, teachers are expected to
promote partnerships with parents (OECD, 2012, p. 12; p. 220). Parents are exhorted
to improve their parenting skills, to ensure that their children are competent workers
able to grow their Human Capital for national advantage. Here the state, supported
by communities (p. 220), can offer policy strategies including ‘legal instruments,
financial and non-financial incentives’ (p. 12) to ensure parental engagement in ECE.
Children are the objects of such policy, by states increasingly keen to manage their
outcomes, and later performance; however a narrow HCT focuses ‘may actually
exacerbate inequalities’ (Prevention Action Newsletter, 2011).
Universities, Polytechnics and PTEs continue in a competitive environment,
where the former position themselves as able to deliver post-graduate qualifications
and research (e.g., McCutcheon, 2012). Government policy sets out different
expectations for sections of the Tertiary Education Sector, including expecting
Universities to ‘ provide a wide range of research-led degree and post-graduate
education’, while PTEs are expected to ‘enable students to complete high quality
qualifications that lead to employment’ (Tertiary Education Strategy, 2010–2015).
While universities may have the luxury of seeking creativity, this is not always
possible in institutions that are poorly funded, with completion of qualifications
their prime aim. Is creativity possible in a two-tier system, where the instrumental,
narrowly vocational emphasis is on skills and credentials at the expense of a wider
knowledge and pedagogy that includes a philosophy of creativity? The lights of
the university shine brightly, with the possibilities of partnerships, new pedagogies,
and new technologies. PTEs, however, sit in the shadows of vocational imperatives,
bound by the contractual ties of narrow policy visions.
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NOTES
1 This model applies equally to ECE centres and tertiary education institutions.
2 A model that continues as a part of discourse on quality today.
3 Colleges of Education provided training for both primary and kindergarten teachers (Lind &
Wadsworth, 2009). Government intended to retain interest in the training of such teachers (Department
of Education, 1988, p27).
4 In 1996, because of a teacher shortage, and pressure from polytechnics, the Ministry of Education
opened the field up to new providers ( Jesson, 1997, cited in Cameron & Baker, 2004, p. 17). See
Rivers, 2006, pp. 22–4 for discussion on the poor PBRF rating or numbers of research-active ITE staff.
5 This was successfully tested by one group of providers, arguing ‘that the Crown had failed to fund
Wananga equitably when compared to other tertiary education institutions, such as universities,
polytechnics, and colleges of education’ (Waitangi Tribunal, 1999).
6 NZQA accreditation is formulated as standards and competencies, set by standard-setting bodies, such
as Industry Training Organisations, or National Qualifications Services. This process, with its close
ties to vested interests, such as employers, and with pre-approval of any curricula, has the effect of
ossifying the curricula content, some suggest ( See Hunt, 2009; Appanna & Goundar, 2011). Across
the spectrum of PTEs offering a range of qualifications, the experiences and process have not always
been particularly successful in seeking a balance between education, and management’s maximization
of profit (e.g. Hunt, 2009; Appanna & Goundar, 2011). It is not the intent of this paper to plot a history
of these training providers, focusing instead on PTEs who provide initial training for Early Childhood
Education teachers.
7 Formerly known as the Teacher Registration Board, established under Education Act, 1989, section
X. See Fitzsimons, P, 1997, for a critique of its role, and that of others charged under the Act with
ensuring satisfactory standards for teachers and teaching.
8 This was a role the NZTC shared with other tertiary audit bodies: New Zealand Qualifications
Authority, Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics Quality and the Committee on University
Academic Programmes (CUAP) for programmes from the universities (p. 1).
9 There is ongoing debate on the minimum numbers of qualified staff in each EC centre. The National
Government reduced the 100% requirement of trained teachers to 80%.
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AFFILIATION
M. J. Stuart
Te Tari Puna Ora o Aotearoa NZ Childcare Association
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