As announced by Education Minister Hekia Parata at the NZTech Advance Education Technology Summit in Auckland last month, digital technology is to be formally integrated into the New Zealand curriculum. The follow up announcement from the Minister of an immediate $1 million investment in initiatives to help schools engage their students in digital technologies sends a strong message of commitment.
The inclusion in the curriculum is a great first step in ensuring we have a world-leading education system to cope with the demands of the fast-approaching digital future. Despite the long-term interest in digital citizenship there is wide spread concern from the industry that the pace of change is not fast enough.
The Leader’s Forum at the summit identified that partnerships between the public and private sectors, and the technology industry are critical. The discussion forum also identified three primary areas of challenge that will need to be addressed in order to achieve the Minister’s goals of having New Zealand schools successfully teaching digital technology and computational thinking from year one by 2018. These include; engaging the influencers, preparing the teachers and development of resources.
For further information and to view our recommendations, read the full report here.
