Media Release December 19 2012 – for immediate release
Attention: Education and Political Reporters
Education Secretary Resigns
The announcement this afternoon that the Secretary for Education has resigned her post just 14 months into the job is no
shock to the New Zealand Principals’ Federation (NZPF) President, Paul Drummond.
‘The Secretary has been asked to implement policy that comes directly from an economic model of education and is
completely at odds with what Kiwi kids need, what the New Zealand public wants, what the teaching profession knows is
right and the way schooling operates in New Zealand,’ said Drummond. ‘Under these circumstances, she was destined to
fail,’ he said.
The Secretary was appointed to head up a world class education system but without the necessary cultural understandings
and experience to successfully progress the system and meet the challenges it presented.
‘I believe there always was a mismatch between the Secretary’s undoubted qualities and the New Zealand context,’ he
said.
‘Coupled with the wrong educational policy this was the wrong appointment for New Zealand.’
ENDS