What is Education Now?
Education Now provides schools with tools to gather the voices of leaders, teachers, students, whānau and the Board. It is designed to be part of ERO’s School Improvement Framework, Te Ara Huarau.
Education Now includes tailored surveys which have questions aligned to the School Evaluation Indicators (2016) and participating schools will receive a report summarising information about their school drawn from these surveys.
Why take part in Education Now?
Education Now provides an easy-to-use evaluation platform, aligned to the School Evaluation Indicators, which can contribute to a school’s evaluation programme. It helps gather multiple voices from the school community and is useful for informing decision making.
Education Now is also an opportunity for learners and schools to be represented in NZ-wide data. In completing the surveys, schools will also be helping ERO build a national picture of how education is going in NZ. Anonymised national findings will be used to highlight trends and influence improvements to education in NZ.
How does Education Now work?
Education Now consists of online surveys for school leaders, board, teachers, learners, and their whānau. The survey questions are distilled from current research, practice and ERO’s evaluation focus areas.
Here are sample questions from each of the surveys offered: Most survey questions have a response scale that measures the level of agreement (e.g., Strongly disagree, Disagree, Agree, Strongly agree, Don’t Know) or frequency of occurrence (e.g. Never, Sometimes, most of the time, All of the time, Don’t know). There are a few open-ended questions.
Students:
- The teacher tells me what I’m good at
- I am progressing well in my learning
- My teacher pronounces Māori words well
- I work with different groups of students
- My school incudes or involves my family/whānau in my learning
Parents:
- My child feels like they belong in this school
- My child is progressing well as a learner
- My child’s school promotes high academic standards
- Teachers provide clear feedback to my child on their learning
- My child’s school board understands my needs and concerns as a parent/whānau
- The assessment processes help me understand where my child is at with their learning
Leaders:
- My students are achieving at the expected level
- The curriculum reflects students in the school and our local area
- There are processes for students to have a say in the school environment and culture
- Our teachers ensure that difference and diversity are valued
- Our school actively involves parents and whanāu when making important decisions
- Senior leaders keep up to date on research on what effective teaching looks like
Teachers:
- The school leadership team shares a clear direction for the school
- My students are achieving at the expected level
- My school does well in supporting the wellbeing of its staff
- Our school makes robust inquiries about the progress of our ākonga/students
- We link new content to students’ prior knowledge
- My students are achieving at the expected curriculum level
Board:
- Across the members of the board, there is a good range of relevant knowledge and skills
- As a board we spend time understanding the barriers to learning which may exist for some of our students and search out strategies to eliminate them
- The school’s students are achieving at the expected level
- Our school has strong connections with other local schools
- Aotearoa New Zealand’s education system is well set up to support students in future employment
Want to find out more about Education Now?
Te Ihuwaka (ERO’s Education Evaluation Centre) is managing the Education Now surveys.
If you have any queries about the surveys, please email the Education Now inbox: educationnow@ero.govt.nz and someone from Te Ihuwaka will be in touch soon.