Judith Nowotarski

Hekia Parata is away on holiday working like a navvy in Europe at an Education Conference that conveniently happens to be in Amsterdam, followed by a little side trip to Paris, taking along union bosses for a little sharing of the trough in a bid to try to tame them.

Here is her week in review, she started in London:

London today with Sir Michael Wilshaw, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills. twitter.com/hekiaparata/st…

— Hekia Parata MP (@hekiaparata) March 11, 2013

Then she attended a Commonwealth Day function:

Attended the Commonwealth Day reception at Marlborough House in London. Great to catch up with Sir Anand Satyanand. twitter.com/hekiaparata/st… — Hekia Parata MP (@hekiaparata) March 12, 2013

Then she and “her team” whizzed off to Amsterdam:

Just arrived in Amsterdam with the NZ Union & Teacher Leader delegation to attend the 2013 International Summit on the Teaching Profession. — Hekia Parata MP (@hekiaparata) March 12, 2013

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Why do Herald reports like Kate Shuttleworth just repeat PPTA/NZEI nonsense without questioning anything?

First she quotes at length a Nelson teacher who claims to have managed Charter Schools in many places around the world like Jordan, UAE and Pakistan and spent 10 years “repairing the damage”.

Right – sure he did. And how relevant are those countries and how important are anecdotes like that to a country like New Zealand trying to improve the lot of those kids the NZEI/PPTA system is failing?

Then clearly without having read the latest Credo report or the Swedish data released at the end of 2012 Shuttleworth does no background research into the New Orleans Charters School situation but quotes at length a mother from New Orleans who appears to have taken personal offence.

Maybe Kate could have found a few articles on google from credible journalists that say things like:

“The reforms had begun before Katrina, but the pace was accelerated after the disaster. It is now the only US city where a majority of public school pupils – around eight in ten – attend charter schools, which are non-unionised and enjoy a rare degree of operational independence from government. (no wonder the unions here are worried)  Read more »