Developed
p. 55 · Read in the full issue
Opinion
Developed NZ may be, but educated it is not
This is going to be a big year for New Zealanders. There will be a general election and the defence of international yachting’s biggest prize, the America’s Cup. Auckland will host the biggest international meeting ever held in this country with the leaders of the United States, China, Russia and Japan heading a host of del egations to the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation group’s annu al summit.
And 1999 will end, of course, with the biggest New Year’s Eve bash in a century as New Zealanders are among the first peoples to welcome a new millennium.
But how many of them will be able to read about these events or write letters to friends and relatives elsewhere in the world to tell them what is going on?
That is the sobering thought this New Year in the wake of some quite shocking reports about the standard of literacy in a country that claims to be one of the most developed as it nears the 21st century.
Developed it may be, educated it is not, the reports show.
The Education Review Office tells us that one-in-four young sters leave school unable to read and write properly. Over three quarters of our schools are not capable of teaching them to read well their teaching methods are “vague, haphazard, inaccurate, patchy and uneven,” the ERO says.
The consequence of this is seen in another survey, conducted by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, which says four out of 10 adult New Zealand workers are below the minimum level of literacy competence required for everyday life.lt is not just a matter of failing to measure up when it comes to using information in charts, forms and graphs.
They can’t do basic sums and 50 per cent of workers in the manufacturing, construction and agriculture industries are inca pable of dealing with written demands at their jobs. Worse, one in-five of the country’s MANAGERS in all industries have sub
standard literacy skills. And the abilities of six-out-10 working in the business and finance sectors are below par. With this situation, it is hard to see how New Zealand is going to foot it in competi tion with the best in the world in the new millennium.
And it has to be said at this stage that with the Maori and Pacific Island populations generally below European and Asian standards of education and literacy, there is little chance of them already seriously disadvantaged - making progress in an increas
ingly challenging workplace.
Employers point out the serious implications for the economy.
For a start, no workplace can afford to have employees who are unable, for example, to follow health and safety instructions.
The outlook for the 50 per cent of blue collar workers who are below basic literacy levels is grim. Many, if not most, will be in jobs that are going to disappear early in the next century as the rapid pace of new technology continues.
Their sub-standard reading, writing and numeracy skills will be critical factors in the ability of industry to adopt the new tech nology employers will have to embrace to remain competitive in the global economy of the 21st century.
Their deficiencies will not only limit their prospects of finding jobs, but could confine companies to economic backwaters and restrict the country’s ability to prosper.
Against this background, the government has launched a new scheme aimed at ensuring that by the year 2005 every nine-year old child in the country will be able to read, write and understand maths.
The scheme is particularly aimed at schools with high propor tions of Maori and Pacific Island children on their rolls.
Comparative studies show that New Zealand nine-year-olds lag well behind their counterparts in other countries in maths, but Polynesian kids are even further behind. In reading, there is a “sig nificant” gap in the abilities of Maori and Pacific Island students and others.
The $19.5 million the government is putting into the scheme over three years is little enough compared with the $65 million a year it is already spending on basic training programmes for 16 and 17 year olds who have left school lacking basic reading, maths and life skills.
And it is long overdue when you consider the brilliant Books in Homes programme devised by Maori author Alan Duff, which has given out more than half a million books to about 40,000 young sters over the last four years. A 1996 study of youngsters aged nine and 12 found that reading was the least popular of nine spare time activities and there is no reason to suppose that has changed with the continuing popularity of television, skate-boarding and other pastimes.
Duff rightly believes that reading - and reading early in a child’s life - is the critical key to lifting his young peoples’ edu cation standards and therefore employment prospects.
The government, always strapped for cash, says it cannot do it all and it has appealed to businesses, communities, families and whanau to “give our kids the world by teaching them to read”, in the words of Prime Minister Jenny Shipley.
Now there’s a New Year resolution. Why not give your kids, your grandchildren and your friends’ and neighbours’ kids a book every now and again?
Even better, teach them to read them. It could make a huge dif ference to their lives in the coming century. ■
David Barber