The Waitangi Tribunal says the Crown needs to change course on its education reforms and return to genuine partnership with Māori after finding multiple breaches of Te Tiriti principles in the redesign of the national curriculum.
The newly released Hūtia te Rito o te Harakeke, kei Hea te Kōmako e Kō? report examines reforms covering both the New Zealand Curriculum and Te Marautanga o Aotearoa, including the Government’s move towards a knowledge-rich curriculum informed by the science of learning.
The Tribunal found the Crown breached the principle of partnership by failing to sufficiently consider what whānau, hapū and iwi wanted for their uri in Māori-medium and kaupapa Māori education.
It also found breaches of equity and good government, including insufficient protection of Māori interests, inadequate consideration of Māori voices and a failure to robustly assess whether the philosophy behind the knowledge-rich approach was appropriate for Aotearoa and Māori learners.
The Tribunal was particularly critical of what it described as insufficient consideration of existing successful Māori education models.
It found the reforms had caused prejudice by damaging the Māori-Crown relationship, diminishing the mana of iwi and hapū that had worked alongside schools and potentially signalling to Māori students and whānau that mātauranga Māori carries less value.
The Tribunal has now recommended the Crown recommit to partnership and work alongside Māori on the design of a genuinely indigenous Māori-medium and kaupapa Māori curriculum through Te Marautanga o Aotearoa.
The report follows an earlier stage of the inquiry which also found Treaty breaches in proposed changes to Treaty provisions within the Education and Training Act. A further report examining the removal of school boards’ Treaty obligations is still to come.
At the centre of the latest findings is a fundamental issue for Māori education: if the system is being redesigned for ākonga Māori, Māori must have a meaningful role in designing it.
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