An amazing principal
The Herald reports:
In 2017, Ngaire Ashmore walked into a school in crisis. Now Auckland Girls’ Grammar School is winning awards, fielding hundreds of out-of-zone applications per year, and 92% of its Year 13 students have gained University Entrance – compared to 48% a decade ago.
The school’s first Māori woman principal spoke candidly to Carolyne Meng-Yee about becoming a mother at 19, challenging low expectations and the personal experiences that shaped her conviction that every student has potential – even when they can’t see it in themselves.
AGGS has an equity score of 487. This means it has a higher than average number of socio-economic barriers. It has fewer than 10% European students.
She has not just doubled their UE rate, but she has almost no difference in outcomes between Maori, Pacific and other students. So how did she do it?
The first two years were tough. There was a lot of resistance to change, and getting everyone on board — particularly the teachers — to believe every student could be an achiever was a challenge.
She overcome resistance to change, and raised expectations.
I knew how to lift achievement for Māori Pacific students.
[When I first got to AGGS] I felt there was a perception among some staff that these students weren’t as capable. I felt the students were being underserved.
She resisted the bigotry of low expectations for ethnic groups that traditionally don’t achieve as well.
Do you think the education system is still asking Māori students to fit into a system that isn’t designed for them?
I think there are things in the system that we need to do better. But I would hate to think the system isn’t working because we must have another system for Māori — because we don’t.
[At school] we need all the values that are important for young people to feel connected, supported and trusted. Māori students learn like everyone else. I don’t think we need to do things differently or make excuses for them.
She explicitly rejects that there must be another system for Maori, and that Maori students learn differently. And she has almost 90% of Maori students at her school getting UE.
I learned that every student can succeed and that what happens outside the school gates should not define their success at school.
I think this is so important. Far too many people in education seem to think socio-economic success is destiny. They explain away everything as a function of poverty. They think that a school with a high equity number can’t be expected to get results as good as a low equity score.
This is not an argument that socio-economic factors don’t matter. Of course they do. But it is an argument that they are not and should not be determinative.