School backing for boards

Press, 24 August 1988, Page 10

School backing for boards

Most staff and school committees of Canterbury schools do not want education' boards to be abolished. A survey of schools in the Canterbury Education Board district has shown that both groups favour retaining the education boards, with an amended constitutional base. Only 14.1 per cent of the committees and 7.6 per cent of the staff supported the Picot task force recommendation to replace the boards. At the same time, the schools did not want the present system to remain. Less than 10 per cent of staff and committees voted in favour of maintaining the education boards as they are. The chairman of the Canterbury committee of branches of the

N.Z.E.1., Mr Brian Inch, said it was apparent that the education boards still had a part to play in the revised plan for the administration of education. The education board structure was perceived as being able to accomplish things more cheaply and efficiently than individual schools, he said. The schools that favoured retaining the boards tended to be rural or small. Schools in Timaru also wanted an education board presence to be maintained. The survey on the proposal to disestablish the education boards has also been made in other education board districts. All results have been forwarded to the Minister of Education, Mr Lange.