NCEA Change Package Questions and Concerns

NCEA Change Package Concerns and Questions

Foreword

The argument on the benefits of education change is greatly dependent on which side the ledger an educator sits. On one side, it is easy to be seduced by the virtues of a highly structured, highly regulated education model linking assessment to tradition and academic success.

However, for most teachers, there is a recognition that the world beyond the classroom has changed, morphed and evolved. Today’s students will graduate from secondary school into a world defined by convergence as interdisciplinary bodies of knowledge merge and respond to the blending of traditional subject silos.

Since its launch, NCEA has offered the flexibility, learning innovation and personalisation for students to reflect and respond to the changing world. This assessment system provides a rich real-world learning opportunity for students, and in turn has amplified the options with equal relevance to the aspirations of students with academic, vocational or non-traditional career intentions.

As a nation, students are facing unprecedented change and disruption. New global challenges, including inequality, sustainability and technological advances, require the ability to problem-solve and tackle challenges specific to this generation.

Broadening students’ understanding of the world and enriching the educational experience has become critical if we are to help build contemporary skills and knowledge for the future.

The flexibility and inclusion and optionality offered by NCEA has established and forged education progress, supported by the ability to contextualise education and respond to learners’ individual needs.

Education is changing, and students are caught in the middle of this transitional period between the debates of the past and the aspirations of the future. As educators, there is the ability to drive education progress through the facilitation of courageous conversations and bold actions or to hold a generation back through comfort and familiarity of the past.

NCEA has been a catalyst for progress and a signal of education change. Let the momentum and the bravery continue.

Frances Valintine CNZM

The Mind Lab/Tech Futures Lab

Introduction

From the NCEA Review Background (2018):

NCEA was introduced because of dissatisfaction with the previous system. Many learners left school with no qualifications or qualifications that did not recognise all of their learning, due to:

The heavy focus on external assessment (especially exams)
The limited number of subjects assessed, which limited what was offered in schools
Success being determined to some extent by a belief that some subjects were more ‘worthy’ than others, with marks scaled accordingly
Pass rates being set for each subject, which meant students could pass or fail based on how others performed, not their own skills or knowledge.

NCEA was established as a flexible, inclusive model and has become one of the most open and transparent school qualification systems in the world. Instead of passing and failing a set percentage, any learner who demonstrates that they have met the standard succeeds.

This statement from the NCEA Review Background (2018) highlights just how much the NCEA Change Package (2019) is a departure from concerns raised only last year. Whilst the ‘Big Opportunities’ felt like a courageous step forward, the NCEA Change Package feels like, as a whole, a massive step back, an opportunity lost.

One of the guiding principles of the NCEA review was wellbeing. In the background document it talked about the damage that overassessment has done.

Overassessment

Many learners are achieving upwards of 120 credits in each year of NCEA, far more than the 60 to 80 credits they need. Some use this to demonstrate their abilities and as a source of motivation. In other cases, attempting more credits than needed builds a safety net to ensure they achieve an NCEA. But a relentless focus on credits and reassessment opportunities can result in pressure, stress, and anxiety, particularly when internal assessments run near continuously throughout a year. This can have a real, negative impact on how learners experience education and their overall health.

The NCEA Change Package had an incredible opportunity to provide courageous thought leadership that was clearly guided by a moral purpose and could have put the wellbeing of the student at the heart of the new package design. Instead we have a new model of NCEA on the table that has seen absolutely no reduction of credits at any level (if we include Literacy and Numeracy as a pathway into Level One) and instead of reducing the overall number of years that students focus on NCEA it has extended it to SEVEN years if they are to start their NCEA journey in Year Seven. ERO highlighted this very issue in the report Wellbeing for Young People’s Success at Secondary Schools (2015). Recommending that schools “review their assessment programme, in particular the number of credits available for each year, using the intent of NCEA”. We are now presented with a NCEA Change Package that states “Guidance will be introduced indicating that most students should attempt no more than 120 credits at Level 1 and 2, and 100 credits at Level 3.” Not only is this seemingly contradicting your own guiding principle, it is totally contradicticting a recommendation made by a national level evidence-based report which squarely placed over-assessment as the main threat to student wellbeing. Where is the courage, care and thought-leadership of a government who cares about wellbeing so much they have put it as the central principle of our national budget?

In the NCEA Review Background document you talk about how NCEA’s openness and flexibility.

While NCEA’s openness and flexibility promote inclusiveness, it can also make it hard for every learner to access diverse and coherent courses and meaningful personalisation. At times, it can permit generic approaches to course and programme design, which don’t prepare all learners for their next steps. These approaches can particularly disadvantage our most vulnerable learners.

Whilst it is stated that NCEA’s flexibility can also risk permitting “generic approaches to course and programme design”, you have now introduced large inflexible standards with only four standards per subject which will undoubtedly encourage increasingly generic course design. We suspect that the new standard design is a means of ensuring that students are forced to experience broader coverage within each subject? However, as all subjects and standards ultimately remain optional we are not sure such an approach is actually addressing the concern at hand. It would seem, at least from what we see here, a misguided “simple solution” to the complex problem of equitable delivery of a broad curriculum.

In the NCEA Review Background you talk about valuing all quality pathways.

Valuing all quality pathways

Many people hold the perception that not all pathways within the NCEA system are equal – particularly that courses based on unit standards are less valued than those based on achievement standards. NCEA should give learners, employers, and educators confidence that a diverse range of quality pathways are available.

However, in establishing what could become an even greater source of division with the introduction of the concept of “vocational excellence”. Surely excellence is excellence, vocational or otherwise. Again, this appears to be an overly simplistic solution to a complex problem - that of the perceived lesser value of the vocational pathway. Surely segregation by separate labelling will only further reinforce its otherness?

The NCEA Review Background also highlighted the value of the responsiveness of the current framework.

A stronger NCEA, which addresses this issue and is more responsive to the needs of those who use it, could support improved learner and teacher wellbeing, drive improvements in equitable access to success, and make space for high-quality teaching.

It does therefore seem that the recommended changes are counterintuitive in moving to larger standards, and therefore less responsive, and what will undoubtedly become a less personalisable NCEA.

In closing, the NCEA Change Package (2019) presents the following concerns:

In 2018 we were presented with innovative, future focused opportunities that we were given the opportunity to feedback on. In 2019 we have been presented with a very very different NCEA Change Package that we do not have the opportunity to provide feedback on.
It is clear that the latter document was the direct result of the intervention of the coalition of Principals who were upset by the innovations presented in the “big opportunities”. This resulted in the Professional Advisory Group being formed, the membership of which was limited to a group of educators who came from schools delivering relatively traditional approaches to NCEA thereby limiting the opportunity for new recommendations being “future-proofed”.
The current system is flexible and future-focused. We are only just making good use of flexibility and ability to contextualise the many standards we have available. It feels like we are about to take a backwards step just as we are realising the potential of the current NCEA framework.
The NCEA Change Package represents a missed opportunity to genuinely reduce credits and the associated stress and anxiety. We have increased and expanded the focus on high stakes assessment, starting as early as Year Seven, meaning students will be focusing on NCEA for seven years (more than half) of their school life.

Claire Amos

Principal Albany Senior High School

Co-founder DisruptED NZ

Questions and comments about the NCEA Change Package

The following questions have been crowd sourced from a range of secondary principals and educators from the DisruptED community. (The DisruptED is a network designed to bring together educators celebrating stories of disruption and innovation! It currently has 800+ members from across New Zealand).

Note - many of the educators in the DisruptED community acknowledged the positive changes in regards to making NCEA more accessible and the integration of Te Ao Māori and mātauranga Māori into the outcome statements and the development of more standards to make sure that mātauranga Māori is acknowledged and credentialed equally by NCEA.

Make NCEA more accessible
Mana Ōrite mo te Mātauranga Māori

How they’re going to ensure the kaupapa of the mātauranga Māori standards?
Mātauranga Māori must not be an add on.
If they’re going to bring current standards like Māori performing arts in line with dance and drama (ie both be UE) will they also expect it to become 50:50 like everything else (again how do you keep the kaupapa?).

Strengthen literacy and numeracy requirements

We would like further clarification about the literacy / numeracy requirements. These requirements as they stand pose a very big risk in terms of narrowing of the curriculum at Years 7 and 8, and the impact of moving high stakes assessment further ‘down’ the schooling years.
What will the external measures look like? Widespread consultation would be needed to come up with meaningful and realistic standards here.
We are concerned at the language of external grading of literacy and numeracy standards to “guarantee credibility”. This plays into misconceptions about internal vs external assessment and the professionalism of teachers to assess work.
What does a literacy / numeracy ‘co-requisite’ offer in terms of preparation for university and vocational pathways (as presented in the change document) if a 10 year old can obtain it?
It is still confusing because students will still need ‘80’ credits (60 + 20 lit/num). This has not made it simpler. (This is from one of my students).
What is the impact of using the PACT tool in assessing Literacy and Numeracy? This is a good tool, but it is a very in depth and intensive process.
Will Mātauranga Māori be recognised as a basis for an equally essential form of literacy?

Have fewer, larger standards

When will we know the exact nature and mix of the ‘external’ assessments?
Will there be options for alternative times for assessment and not just the ‘end of the year’. Our school does get affected a lot by transience and if they can only get the credits they need from these end of year assessments / exams this will have a big impact on results.
We are concerned about the focus on ‘subjects’ - this appears to read as traditional subjects and definitely seems a backwards step. (And I note all the examples only list traditional subjects). Whilst the mythbusters document did state integrated subjects were possible it would seem the current structures actually (possibly inadvertently) reinforce more siloed subject teaching and assessment, not less.
‘Traditional subjects’ have been failing to engage and inspire learners, nor lead them to ‘life long learning’ and much of the innovation with the NCEA was aimed at changing this. There are real risks in terms of reducing achievement in these plans, especially for our Maori and Pasifika akonga.
A big challenge in rewriting the standards is who and how this will be done. Whilst in general there is support for fewer, larger standards we don’t want the assessment requirements to increase - far too much time is spent currently on very large scale reports / essays / portfolios which is a challenge to meaningful teaching and learning time.
Is the intention that the new standards adding up to 20 credits will cover the entirety of Level 6 of the curriculum in that subject? I was involved in writing the maths curriculum and I know it was never intended to be covered in one teaching year.
There is also inequity between subjects with multiple ‘courses / subjects’ in areas such as social sciences and science and far fewer in maths and English. What ‘subjects’ will be chosen to get 20 credits.
How will you decide which standards are internal and which are external? Who will set the external assessments each year?
Where is the flexibility? Where is the future focus? Where is the opportunity for meeting the needs of our community? We can’t see any evidence of these aspects at present.
We can see that parts of this package are aimed at reducing workload for teachers. We are not convinced of how it reduces workload for students nor truly how it will reduce workload for teachers.
What aspects of the fewer, larger standards are designed to support student workload / wellbeing / anxiety?
In speaking to our student leaders they are very concerned about the significant rise in external assessment - I guess if this doesn’t mean ‘exam’ then there are options. But again it is seen as reducing the workload of teachers (in terms of marking - although of course it will be teachers who do the external marking but I guess at least they will be paid for it) but it doesn’t reduce the workload for students.
Where is the evidence-based decision making in regards to 50:50 split of internal and external? Is it about teacher workload or not trusting teacher judgement?
Can we lose bell curve/PEP grading of externals full stop? What reassurances will we have that a move to more external won’t mean more students failing for the sake of perceived rigour?
Where will the extra people and extra money for more external marking and moderation come from?
How ‘timely’ will the marking of externals be? If this is all done at the end of the year we are less able to be responsive to our students needs as we won’t know where they sit particularly with the lucky dip nature of external assessment at present (see PEP comment above). In particular, this poses a big risk in terms of our students who tend to be very transient (this is the number one factor in underachievement at present at my school) and also look to complete qualifications early in the year so they can move on to work, apprenticeships or mid year study intakes.
Recent information on what external assessment could look like includes a list of portfolios, reports, common assessment tasks and 'performances'. Can we get some clarity on how the external assessment of performances might work? Will performances be recorded or viewed live? We know that audience engagement is a critical factor in performances and losing this through recording would be extremely detrimental.
I think this will make it more challenging for integrated courses like our Innovation programme to offer authentic meaningful assessment tasks - particularly if the 50% that is external is set externally and not linked to the local curriculum.
A glimmer of hope - what does “Integrate different sources of knowledge from the National Curriculum, into achievement standards, unit standards and associated materials” mean? Some cross curricular standards based on the Key Competencies?
What does “Through this process, we want to explore ways that students can access opportunities to credential a wider variety of content, such as extracurricular activities, strengths and skills, or work experience, as part of their NCEA” mean?
Where is the place of micro-credentials here? Would they sit outside the 60 credits required? Why would they?
If you are accrediting strengths and skills what are these in the context of 21st Century and which ones will/should we value?
Why would you expand course endorsements to achieve? In their current form these have very little value, and again this seems an outdated way of recognising achievement in separate silos / subjects.
Can we clarify that the consultation with subject associations will ensure a diverse range of opinions from a variety of different styles and types of schools? Some subject associations certainly lack diversity in this regard and if their voice is going to have a huge sway on which standards and which ‘externals’ it is crucial that we hear from a wide range of people and of course students.

Simplify NCEA’s structure

There isn’t really a reduction of credits as students already had to get 60 credits at levels 2 and 3 and with the ‘removal’ of the literacy and numeracy credits from the qualification this also links to the 60 currently needed at Level 1.
We have very real concerns about the guidance on the number of credits entered each year. Why would you enter 120 if you only need 60 to get the qualification?
The 120 credits / 20 credits per course rationale seems to be counterintuitive. Again this seems a backwards step.
In what ways are teacher workload reduced by maintaining the ability for students to resubmit work? Particularly if this increases the need for further assessment opportunities?
The adjustments to the resubmission process seems inherently unfair and inequitable. For example, a student that does not achieve is able to submit for an Achieved (Only), even if in the resubmission process their work lifts to a M or E (which is possible in many learning areas). Is this the intention?
We are concerned about the potentially decreasing opportunity to provide learning opportunities for students that are authentically transdisciplinary solving real world issues. Particularly if everything had to be in “courses” of 120 credits.
We would like to better understand the nature of course endorsements and the privileging of external assessment as a measure of success in ‘courses’. Assuming the current position is maintained, in order to gain a course endorsement, students would still need to complete an external assessment. For learners that prefer to be assessed internally, this precludes them from gaining an endorsement for their learning.

Show clearer pathways to further education and employment

How will University Excellence and Vocational Excellence have parity? What is the deal with Vocational Excellence? This could be seen as another absolutely backwards step.
How will the Ministry of Education ensure that the public value these equally? Our concern is that we will end up in a 1970's UK model of 'grammar schools' and 'technical colleges', this reinforces the them and us.
Projects and the concept of standards based on the structure of project-based learning and design thinking presented an exciting and future-focused approach to recognising the skills needed for further education and employment - where have these gone? Surely simply making them optional would have addressed concerns raised out of the “big opportunities” document.
Could we have micro credentials (basically what they are planning with lit and num) for 21st century skills that students can earn before they graduate?

Keep NCEA Level 1 as an optional level

You state “many school leaders wanted to keep Level 1 as it keeps their students motivated by giving them a goal to work towards.” This seems like an absolutely appalling reason to retain a Level One option that only adds to a lack of wellbeing and an increased focus on assessment over inclusive, high quality and creative teaching and learning programmes as a means of engaging learners.
Surely the concern about some students leaving with only Level One may be addressed by those students taking more time to engage in a slower, more supported and unpressured pathway to Level Two?
By making it “optional” for schools you are you are not actually making it optional for students as many schools will continue to use Level One as a hoop and a prerequisite for Level Two courses. What an absolutely heartbreaking missed opportunity for signaling to our schools and communities that we are committing to reducing over assessment. And what a missed opportunity to reduce workload (and cost of resourcing) by a third!

Signatories

Claire Amos ( Principal, Albany Senior High School)

Louise Addison (Principal, Edgewater College)

Steve Mouldey (Principal, AGE School)

Karen Gilbert-Smith (Principal, Whangarei Boys High School)

Di Cavallo (Deputy Principal, Hobsonville Point Secondary School)

Sally Hart (Deputy Principal, Hobsonville Point Secondary School)

Rachel Clothier-Simmonds (Principal, Otamatea High School)

Andrew D Lessard

Anne Cooper (Whangarei Girls’ High School)

Nicola Ngarewa

Plus a range of contributions from the DisruptED Community

If you would like to be added as a signatory please let us know!