Treaty advocate and lawyer Tania Waikato has responded to comments made by Education Minister Erica Stanford over the creation of a list of schools that have committed to upholding Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
As of yesterday, 1306 schools – more than half of schools in the country – feature on what is dubbed Te Rārangi Rangatira. Waikato has been publishing a daily update of the list with a map of Aotearoa showing the location of schools.
Stanford was unrepentant when asked by a journalist this week if she was concerned about the response from schools.
“I think there's a huge amount of pressure on the sector - very, very unfair, quite nasty pressure - that's been put on principals who are ringing me saying that they don't like the pressure that's been put on them, and quite often they're signing up when in fact it wasn't something they particularly wanted to do but they feel that there's pressure on them from certain people in society,” she said.
“And I think it's frankly disgusting the behaviour creating maps around the country and lists that people feel they have to be on otherwise they'll be maligned. I think that that kind of behaviour is awful.”
In response, Waikato denies the list is an organised campaign and says it grew organically from a social media post.
“The kura started sending me their letters after I posted Whakatāne High School's one up, and in the beginning there was only five, so I went 'oh, that's cool, I'll make a list'. So I made a list,” she said.
"I think the second day we had about 60 and then the third day, 200. And now, nāianei, neke atu i te (there’s over) 1200.”
She said that while she publishes the list as a daily update on social media, the pressure is coming from the schools community.
“This is not a political party, this is not an activist group pushing these schools to do this, this is everyday mums and dads, kura, teachers, principals, boards of trustees, doing this themselves.”
Waikato said schools understand the significance of what it means to take out the Treaty requirement from the Education and Training Act 2020, which includes an impact on funding.
“[Schools] realise that once you take the obligation out of the law, then what naturally follows is that whatever funding that might've been allocated to assist with that particular legislation is also going to, all of a sudden, disappear.”
She said principals have told her about how they have worked with iwi and hapū on school programmes and will now have to find the funding to continue them.
Response from principals and schools
Stephen Lethbridge, principal of Auckland’s Pt Chevalier School-Rangi-mata-rau, believes Te Tiriti was never meant to be optional.
“It’s our foundational document and removing it from the Education Act just means that we can take it or leave it, and that’s the wrong message to be sending our Māori whānau.”
He added that the school was always focused on raising academic achievement.
Heidi Hayward, principal of Dunedin North Intermediate School, told 1News their school board feels both “insulted and patronised”.
“We don't really see Te Tiriti as a compliance task as a board and I think, arguably, as a nation we've actually moved beyond that.”
Both Point Chevalier School-Rangi-mata-rau and Dunedin North Intermediate School are on Te Rārangi Rangatira.
The New Zealand Catholic Education Office has reached out to all 235 Catholic schools in the country to urge them to uphold Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
Its chief executive Dr Kevin Shore said: “Our message is we are strong supporters of partnership, we are strong supporters of Te Tiriti. We want our whānau and ākonga to thrive.”
'Raising Māori achievement'
Minister Stanford’s message to schools is for achievement to improve, “especially for our tamariki Māori”.
She said: “If those schools are doing all of the things that we're asking of them in Section 127, including offering te reo, being culturally responsive, and ensuring that tamariki Māori have equal outcomes, and then if they wish to honour the Treaty and uphold the Treaty above and beyond that then they are absolutely welcome to do that, and that's what they would like to do.”
She added: “We are raising Māori achievement in reading, writing and mathematics - that is upholding the Treaty and that's what I expect schools to do.”
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