One of the few things we can say with any certainty is that change is inevitable and that predictability is a thing of the past. The pace of change as we enter the 21st century is probably greater then at any other time in our history. Major economic and cultural changes are occurring with increased urbanisation and the development of a global economy and the global world. Immense changes are taking place in the labour market and technological change continues unabated. “60% of current children in Year 3 will enter careers that do not yet exist, using technology that has yet to be invented.” (Ken Richardson I.C.P. Conference, Geneva 1993).
Education has changed in many ways to meet the needs of our changing economic and societal demands. Governments have urged us to produce a workforce that will be internationally competitive, life long learners and contributors to the knowledge based society. Schools have been urged to adopt the market force business model, be competitive with each other and market themselves for extra pupils. World wide there is a trend to self-managing schools, site based governance and decentralisation. (It can be argued that in New Zealand this trend may well be in reverse). An important role of a principal is to have vision – to have goals and aspirations for the future and to try and make some assumptions about what the future may hold. In this regard I wish to canvas what I believe will be some of the future trends in education as we begin our journey into the new millennium.

1. There will be a continuation and extension of the ‘internationalisation’ of education. The telecommunications world of C.N.N and the Internet will enhance this trend, along with the growth of multinationals and the global economy. The administrative and curriculum reforms which we have had in New Zealand since 1989 are part of a worldwide trend. Increased accountability, increased standards, increased qualification, local autonomy, curriculum changes in I.T, values and pre-employment training are all common trends in most countries of the world. Curriculum materials are being more commercially driven and some commonality of materials is evident particularly in adjoining countries.

2. There will be a continuing growth in teacher professionalism and of self-regularisation in particular. This is a logical extension of continuing decentralisation and of self-management. Teacher professionalism and performance accountability will come under increasing scrutiny. Teachers and teacher organisations will be under increasing pressure to be held accountable for the quality of classroom performance. Improved standards, adoption of best practices and measured outcomes will characterise a professional teacher sector. Control and disciplinary power over qualifications and membership of the teaching profession will be peer regulated as for other professions. Changes in employment, pay and career promotion will become quality driven.

3. There will be a reversal in schools to “core business” and a rejection of the entrepreneurial free market model. Schools will go back to meeting parental priorities: providing academic excellence, discipline and standards and subject and option choices. Niche marketing will still have a place in schools with particular strengths eg: music or dance or agriculture or outdoor education. However, those schools specialising more in media savvy and public relations rather than curriculum depth, the scam artists and the flim flam boys will either change to meet the needs of the community or ignore those needs at their peril. There will be a community expectation and demand that schools revert to traditional core purpose and values. The old adage “you can fool some of the people, some of the time, but not all of the people, all of the time” will take on new significance for some schools. Community tolerance and acceptance of other than quality education, high standards and expectations will force an end to an era of liberal experimentation and flirtation with a free market philosophy and place greater emphasis on genuine pedagogy and best practice teaching methodology. The age of the “flim flam boys’ will be over.

4. There will be an accelerated growth in the power and utilisation of the computer and the Internet as a teaching tool, rather then a marketing device. The potential of educational television as a school teaching tool was never reached. With the advert of widespread computer and Internet resources in most schools, information technology will bring about a learning upheaval. Already, it’s potential can be seen in distance education. Children in smaller country schools can study subjects in specialist areas not normally available to them eg: physics. The virtual school is within our grasp. Not only is there the motivational advantages of multi-media, multi-sensory and self pacing but there are also huge equity considerations in both subject provision and quality assurance.

5. Major changes will take place in continuing teacher development (inservice or professional development). As a growth in teacher ‘professionalism’ occurs so too will a trend develop for teachers to take more self-responsibility for their own continued growth. The expectation that professional development should be the responsibility (and the cost) of the state and school will change. Individual teachers will seek out professional development options of their own volition similar to other professional groups. Service delivery will change and the days of one day courses will be numbered. Longitudinal professional courses of study and curriculum development will become more the norm. There can also be an expectation that continued teacher inservice provision will be a requirement of continued teacher registration. Recent research in the U.S. shows that states with high standard pre-entry and inservice requirements lead the nation in student achievement in reading and mathematics (Education Policy Analysis Archives, Jan 2000 Linda Darling-Hammond). Again, the demand for improved pupil outcomes and quality of education will drive this change.

6. My over riding premise is that the demand for better quality education will be at the heart of the trends and changes I have outlined. Ideologically, there will also be some political flirtation with the concepts of performance based pay and parental ‘voucher’ systems. Both are likely to be non-starters for many reasons but primarily because their underlying philosophical concepts are not based on sound educational logic or ‘best practice’ models.

The future is evolving, is exciting and will hopefully bring more credibility to teachers and to the education system. There will be an increasing trend to sound educational practice. It will also mean a lot of hard work for teachers and educators but hopefully the hard work will be more meaningful and professionally satisfying.