spinofflive
Māngere Central School principal Jacqualene Maindonald with student Roanna Wah, prior to lockdown. (Photo: Supplied)
Māngere Central School principal Jacqualene Maindonald with student Roanna Wah, prior to lockdown. (Photo: Supplied)

SocietyAugust 17, 2020

How my daughter’s Māngere primary is bridging the digital divide

Māngere Central School principal Jacqualene Maindonald with student Roanna Wah, prior to lockdown. (Photo: Supplied)
Māngere Central School principal Jacqualene Maindonald with student Roanna Wah, prior to lockdown. (Photo: Supplied)

Much has been made of digital divide, but as Justin Latif has observed in his role as a board of trustee member of Māngere Central School, schools in the area are making big strides to ensure students aren’t left behind.

It’s hard to imagine what lockdown would be like without the limitless time-consuming options provided by the internet. No mindless memes, no Netflix for babysitting, no celebrity zoom singalongs, and possibly not even Saint Ashley’s dulcet tones reassuring us at 1pm everyday.

If you’re a student, having an iPad or laptop is obviously even more important, as it’s the only way to remain connected with your teachers and peers. 

Beyond this current lockdown, laptops and internet access are now obligatory tools for educational and career advancement.

However as research also shows, digital disadvantage is felt most by families in communities like Māngere which has high proportions of Māori and Pasifika students. Not having internet access not only cuts these families off during times of crisis, but it also excludes many in our community from fully participating in our democracy. 

But for my daughter and her classmates at Māngere Central School, this lockdown will be slightly easier than the last one. 

Thanks in part to the Ministry of Education and some savvy planning from the senior leadership* of the school, every year 5 to 8 student of this decile one full primary should have access to a device to continue their learning. 

Staff at Māngere Central School handing out at-home learning packs.

And while online learning isn’t a necessity for year 1 to 4 students for this lockdown period, when all these pupils return to class they will be getting one-to-one access to iPads. 

During the last lockdown, MOE reimbursed schools who bought more devices, and this has meant we can now ensure every child at the school is able to access a laptop or iPad, something that would have been unthinkable for a school like ours six months earlier.

Five-year-olds now get their own personal iPad, which stays in class, from their very first day of school, before transitioning into using a Chromebook by the time they are eight or nine. When they leave at age 12 or 13, they will be given the option of buying their device at a really affordable rate.

Having this increased engagement with digital tools opens students up to a range of new learning possibilities, and it also enables the teachers to utilise social media, graphic design and video making software. 

Māngere Central School principal Jacqualene Maindonald believes the students are more engaged as a result. “I think the students are exhibiting a lot more care and ownership of their own learning, and I think the teachers have been really creative,” she says. 

One of the ways to help with this digital integration within the classroom has been to run mini-workshops along with a whole day Digital Learning Summit.

This was done along with three other local schools, Bader Intermediate, Jean Batten Primary and Ngā Iwi School, and enabled teachers to get upskilled in a range of online programmes including TikTok, GarageBand and Adobe Photoshop. 

“Our four local schools got together because we felt that a need was highlighted during [the first] lockdown and we needed some urgency around supporting teachers, parents and students to engage better online,” Maindonald says. 

“What teachers and students are learning is that a device isn’t just something you sit behind and type on. There’s lots of creative ways you can use a device. It’s something that can record with, you can watch, or you can dance to and that’s what this is about.”

Jean Batten principal Nardi Leonard says training initiatives like this have the potential to unlock a world of possibilities for families in Māngere. “I see this is just the start of some absolutely wonderful things for our community.”

But how is all this possible for a school in a lower socioeconomic area?

To avoid putting unnecessary financial pressure on many families, Māngere Central School doesn’t ask parents to make any kind of donation towards the school’s running costs. This means the school has to be creative in raising extra funds and has looked to access grants from a range of philanthropic and charitable trusts. Over the last three years this approach has brought in an extra $50,000 per year. 

While that amount might not sound like much to some, the money is the means by which the school can provide these extra tools for pupils, over and above the core costs of running the school. 

And just like many schools, a major and constant drain on funds are issues with property, including leaking pipes, mouldy buildings, or much-needed upgrades to playgrounds. In many schools, private investment – or generous parental fundraising – can help pay for these upgrades, but in a community like Māngere we just can’t raise half a million dollars through a fair or a gala dinner.

So while it makes me very proud that we’re able to provide the same opportunities to our pupils that they might get at a higher decile school, there’s always the nagging knowledge that we could be easily sidetracked by a major property project.

As our principal often says, we’ve been lucky. Now we have to make the best of that luck to ensure our kids aren’t left behind.

*Although I am the chair of the Mangere Central School Board of Trustees, I can’t take any credit for the work and strategic foresight of our school’s senior leadership team.

Keep going!
A busy playground in Western Springs, Auckland yesterday (Photo: Toby Manhire)
A busy playground in Western Springs, Auckland yesterday (Photo: Toby Manhire)

SocietyAugust 17, 2020

If Auckland playgrounds are closed, where is the tape?

A busy playground in Western Springs, Auckland yesterday (Photo: Toby Manhire)
A busy playground in Western Springs, Auckland yesterday (Photo: Toby Manhire)

Officially, Auckland playgrounds are closed, but people are still using them because poor signage is making it hard to tell if they’re out of bounds or not.

Last time New Zealand went into level three lockdown, playgrounds were one of the first public areas that were closed to the public. Not only were they closed, they were taped, locked and heavily signposted – it would have been impossible to ignore the instruction that the playgrounds were not to be used.

Round two of level three lockdown started last Wednesday lunchtime for Auckland, and it’s been stated many times by the prime minister and director-general of health that the same rules apply as last time. Despite this, families have swarmed to playgrounds in the sunny weather, and with a number of public playgrounds yet to be signposted or clearly blocked off, they’re being used by hundreds of people daily.

David Murdoch, dean of the University of Otago, Christchurch, is a clinical microbiologist and infectious diseases physician and says playgrounds are risky environments during level three.

“It’s really hard to quantify what the risk is, but looking at playgrounds, they’re just one of those places of congregation – obviously churches have been another focus. They’re places for young children so it’s harder for them to understand the reasons for the physical distancing and being able to adhere to it and control it.”

Experts suggest the virus may be able to stay active on metal and plastic surfaces for up to three days, which means a child may not even have to visit a playground on the same day as an infected person to get the virus. Murdoch says fomite transmission is tricky to quantify, and it is far less likely to occur if the basic health measures are being adhered to – like washing hands.

“In situations where there is regular cleaning obviously that reduces it, and if people are washing their hands regularly. It still has to be acquired by the person so it has to get from an object into the body’s system to cause infection, and that’s another potential barrier.”

An Auckland children’s playground is cordoned off as part of the first lockdown on March 26, 2020 (Photo: Phil Walter/Getty Images)

Earlier, Auckland mayor Phil Goff told Morning Report’s Susie Ferguson that a further 1,000 signs would be placed in Auckland playgrounds today to warn people off using the equipment. He said it’s concerning people aren’t sticking to what they were taught in the first level three lockdown. 

“Younger people congregating around basketball courts, playgrounds et cetera. That is a concern and by the end of today we will have put up about 1,000 notices telling people to stay off playground equipment.”

But he also agreed that signage may not be the most effective way to stop people from using the equipment, and has asked for the taping that was used last lockdown.

“I’ve strongly recommended that they put tape out, because younger people will ignore the notice, but if there’s tape over the equipment, that’s harder to ignore.”

Rod Sheridan, general manager of community facilities at Auckland Council, says there are plans to tape off and lock 60 high-use playground facilities. He told The Spinoff that as of this morning, more than 500 old signs have been removed and around half the playgrounds have new signs in place.

Following the announcement on Friday evening that alert level three would be extended, we mobilised as many contract and council staff as we could to go around the network and remove old signs and replace them with new ones… The remainder will be completed by the end of the day today.

“Around 60 high use playgrounds will be taped off to reinforce that they are closed. Those playgrounds that can be, will be locked.”

One playground at Vic Park was taped this morning. Another, 10m down the road remains in use as of 1pm (Photo: Josie Adams)

The council won’t be taping all playgrounds though, as they say the tape often gets removed and can cause litter problems.”Taping off playgrounds is a deterrent, to reinforce the message carried on a sign. Unfortunately, it is a rudimentary method and tape is often damaged or removed… The council has reviewed its playgrounds and limited this to the sites that are most used and/or are causing the most concern.”

Murdoch says effective health communication is about repetitive messaging, and he doesn’t think it fair that people are being blamed for not knowing every level three restriction. 

“Everybody is having to remember what [level three] was. But in fact we probably spent less time in level three than any other levels so remembering how it’s different from those… repeated messaging is important without any doubt at all.”

The difference between communications in and around playgrounds now versus in the first iteration of level three is stark. In March, swings were bolted together, slides and other equipment was taped off with yellow tape, and signs, like the ones we’re seeing on some playgrounds now, were pasted clearly to multiple parts of the playground. 

Sheridan says the council will be auditing all playground sites daily to ensure the proper signage remains, and asks Aucklanders to report all “damage or removal of signs, or any rogue signs inadvertently overlooked, to the council”.

But wait there's more!