Not enough teachers for te reo demand

Wellington has seen a massive surge in Pa¯ keha¯ learning te reo – but finding enough teachers is proving difficult.

The shortage is such that the primary teachers’ union raised it as a ‘‘first 100 days’’ issue for the new Government to address, while the secondary teachers’ union says those teaching te reo are being pushed to ‘‘extreme’’ workloads.

Night schools are also struggling to cope with what Nigel Sutton, of the Wellington High School Community Education Centre, said was demand from predominantly white, middle-class New Zealanders.

The school, which two years ago ran two levelone courses, now offers seven. Three of the latest round of courses, which opened for enrolments on Tuesday, had filled up by yesterday.

‘‘It really is a phenomenon,’’ Sutton said. New Kiwis, for whom English was a second language, were also signing up.

He was handing out pamphlets on Lambton Quay, in central Wellington, this week and said it was overwhelmingly urban professionals inquiring about the courses.

The surge in interest went back about two years, he said, which would appear to cast doubt on former National leader Don Brash’s recent comments that most New Zealanders had no interest in te reo.

Post-Primary Teachers’ Association (PPTA) president Jack Boyle said there was an overall shortage of secondary teachers entering the workforce, meaning there was also a shortage of those teaching te reo.

Those who did were under massive workloads because they tended to become de facto Ma¯ ori department heads, despite some of them being only recently out of teachers’ college.

‘‘The additional expectations for these workers is insane,’’ he said.

A survey of PPTA members showed most current teachers would jump at the chance to learn te reo, but 60 per cent said they had ‘‘no support’’ from their schools to do so. Those that were learning were doing so off their own bat if they could find the time to, he said.