Education sector agencies to work more closely together

NZQA will be working much more closely with the Ministry of Education and the Tertiary Education Commission following a review of the education sector by the State Services Commission.

The Minister of Education, Trevor Mallard, said the review found that the three agencies needed stronger working relationships amongst themselves and with the sector, and overall they needed strong leadership from the Secretary for Education.

A number of recommendations were made in the light of what the SSC termed "huge changes to education in recent years."

The Acting Chief Executive of NZQA, Karen Sewell, said the review made a number of recommendations with a view to fostering more co-ordinated development, implementation and communication of priorities and monitoring of sector performance.

Key recommendations include:

Karen Sewell, along with the other two chief executives, Howard Fancy from the Ministry of Education and Janice Shiner from TEC, welcomed the report and the directive to work more collaboratively.

Karen Sewell said the three agencies were looking forward to changing the way they worked together to lift the performance of the sector, raise the quality of provision and intervene more effectively to support institutions.

"This is not about adding layers of controls or bureaucracy. It is about working together on our common goals - to set students and adult learners on a path that will contribute positively to their futures and New Zealand's development," she said.

"It requires us to work jointly with the sector in shaping and managing change and ensuring that the policies we are responsible for better support such changes.

"As a result of this review we can expect better co-operation, a clearer sector mandate, improved relationships and improved communication between the agencies," Karen Sewell said.