Streaming in schools: a fast track to nowhere
About eight years ago, I wrote a column about streaming in secondary schools, after a report by Professor Garry Hornby condemned the practice. Though his report was well-researched, streaming in our schools continued to the point that we have one of the most streamed education systems in the world.
Last week, Tokona Te Raki – Ma¯ ori Futures Collective – produced a report called Ending Streaming in Aotearoa, focusing on the teaching of mathematics. It highlighted four New Zealand schools that had recently abolished streaming, with positive results.
How refreshing it is to read new educational research from Aotearoa, and with a Ma¯ ori and Pasifika focus. It’s a welcome change from the many reports, often authored by obscure educators from the United States or Britain, with a procharter schools and ‘‘back to basics’’ bent.
Despite a wealth of evidence that streaming doesn’t work, and that it builds barriers between different ethnic and social groups, many schools stream. The system is also racist. A disproportionate number of Ma¯ ori and Pasifika children end up being placed in the bottom classes – called ‘‘foundation’’ by the schools and ‘‘cabbage’’ by the kids, who can spot a euphemism at a hundred miles, whatever stream they’re in.
According to the report, more than 40 per cent of Ma¯ ori Year 9 students are placed in the bottom ‘‘foundation’’ class, often because they have behavioural problems, not because they are less intelligent. Worse, the expectations of teachers are much higher with the top classes (euphemistically called ‘‘extension’’ or ‘‘accelerated’’) and lower for the bottom classes. If you tell kids that they’re dumb, they’ll act dumb.
As a result, many low-streamed pupils don’t enter NCEA courses, cutting out future career choices. In 2019, one-third of Year 11 Ma¯ ori students were not entered for a full NCEA maths course – yet we have a massive need for more people proficient in STEM subjects.
To make matters worse, the mechanism for deciding who is ‘‘foundation’’ and who is ‘‘extension’’ is greatly flawed. According to Dr Adrienne Alton-Lee, a recent study found that some low achievers weren’t even taught by qualified teachers, but were left with teacher aides. When I relieved foundation maths classes, I was told to focus on basic things like reading timetables rather than ‘‘airy-fairy’’ stuff. Yet I found these kids enjoyed geometry, problem-solving and other creative parts of the curriculum just as much as high achievers.
Tokona Te Raki focused on four schools that had recently abolished streaming in maths: Hastings Girls’ High School, Horowhenua College, Inglewood High School and Wellington High School. All four noted a positive shift in attendance, engagement and achievement when they de-streamed, especially among Ma¯ ori and Pasifika students.
Even better, social and ethnic barriers broke down as kids from different groups engaged more than previously. Classroom behaviour improved, with suspensions (stand-downs) and referrals for classroom behaviour dramatically reducing.
But it wasn’t easy. There was strong resistance from some parents and teachers. A default setting for many maths teachers is that teaching students who are all at the same level is easier.
Despite a wealth of evidence that streaming doesn’t work, and that it builds barriers between different ethnic and social groups, many schools stream.
That might be true in a few cases, but this report shows that the more creative the teaching and curriculum, the easier it is to teach students of different abilities – and you’re not perpetrating apartheid-style social engineering. The report stresses the need for teachers who may not have taught an unstreamed class to be given professional development to assist them. And parents must be engaged and talked through possible changes, not ignored and told what’s best for them.
Will more schools de-stream in the future? I suspect the more progressive ones will, and the traditional ones will not, which is a pity, as the media love to call the old-fashioned, high-decile schools ‘‘top’’ schools, though there is little evidence that they are.
Education Minister Chris Hipkins has said that streaming is wrong, but although he may support efforts to de-stream schools, I suspect he won’t make it compulsory. Canada has done it, but our leaders probably lack the will.
If your child attends a school that likes to issue platitudes about how tolerant and non-racist it is, then ask if they stream. If they do stream, or ‘‘band’’ or ‘‘group’’, or whatever they call it, remind them that they are taking part in one of the most racist, divisive and unequal practices in New Zealand schools today.
Hopefully, I won’t be writing another column in eight years’ time, quoting yet another well-written report that condemns streaming, yet has been roundly ignored by those who run our education system. Kei te tino pai rawe atu a Tokona Te Raki.