Pupils join hīkoi as te Tiriti is removed from curriculum framework

As a Wellington school leader takes 100 of his junior college pupils onto Parliament’s forecourt today alongside the Hīkoi mō te Tiriti, he is freshly motivated to protest.
The pupils are officially there to learn – the trip comes under ‘education outside the classroom’ – but Onslow College deputy principal Connor Baird is fired up.
The trigger is the first of the new national school curriculum framework documents, quietly published in the past few weeks, that remove all mention of the principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
The draft of the new English and maths curriculums, released last year for consultation, defined the guiding principle as, “the overarching kaupapa, expressing the centrality of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and its principles, and New Zealand’s vision for education”.
‘Tiriti’ was mentioned 36 times.
In the final version of the curriculum, just released, it’s not mentioned at all. And the guiding principle is redefined: “The overarching kaupapa guiding the curriculum, based on the science of learning and ensuring excellent and equitable outcomes for students.”
Baird (Waikato-Tainui), who teaches Te Reo Māori and English, learned of the changes through his member of Māori principals association Te Akatea. He says the changes were made without consulting the teaching profession.
“Obviously it matters,” he says. “There’s no evidence to back what it is trying to achieve.”
He believes Māori – and especially young Māori – are being deliberately sidelined. “First, the Māori health authority Te Aka Whai Ora was disestablished. There are changes at Oranga Tamariki. And now the rhetoric is starting to turn to education.”
“Our kids aren’t going to see that bicultural aspect of Aotearoa and understand who they are as they grow up as New Zealanders, and see the relevance of our history and our place, in our local curriculum and in their learning,” he says.
“And two, the priority will be moved away from Māori learners. We all know education has been the biggest driver of colonisation in Aotearoa, for our Māori population.”
Accused by Labour MP Willow-Jean Prime of “whitewashing the curriculum”, Education Minister Erica Stanford said only the English and maths curriculums had been released, thus far.
“There are certain things like the Māori Land Wars, and people like Meri Te Tai (the women’s suffrage campaigner) that we should all learn about,” Stanford said. “Unfortunately, the history curriculum is far too localised and it’s not consistent enough … If the previous government had been concerned about Māori achievement rates, we wouldn’t be sitting at 12 percent of Māori kids being at curriculum for mathematics.”
Her position is backed by Pauline Cleaver, the acting hautū (leader) of the Ministry of Education curriculum centre.
Cleaver says it’s inaccurate to say that the science of learning has replaced Te Tiriti o Waitangi. “The curriculum is underpinned by the science of learning as we have drawn on research from cognitive psychology, neuroscience and education to describe when, how and what content should be taught.”
She says the overarching design principles for updating the curriculum include the commitment that the New Zealand Curriculum will acknowledge Te Tiriti o Waitangi and the bicultural foundations of Aotearoa New Zealand, while reflecting New Zealand’s cultural diversity.
Cleaver says the updated content for the English years 0-6 and mathematics and statistics years 0-8 learning areas of the New Zealand Curriculum explicitly call out context and examples specific to Aotearoa New Zealand and are designed to support and empower all students to learn and achieve personal excellence, regardless of their individual circumstances.
As for Baird and his students, they were meeting at their school at 8.30am today, before catching a train into central Wellington to meet the hīkoi. He acknowledges there are those who may dismiss him as a woke teacher, influencing their kids by taking them along to the hīkoi.
“I am pretty woke!” he laughs.
Yet he unexpectedly agrees there has been a problem with teaching. He says that problem is with schools’ failure to provide New Zealanders with sufficient grounding in their own history, to appreciate the actual role and importance of te Tiriti.
“It’s our own fault that there are people in Aotearoa who have these preconceptions, because it’s obvious that we as a country have not educated our people in a way that they understand Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and that they understand the bicultural nature of Aotearoa, and that there could be multiple ways of understanding the world and functioning.”