Events

🌟NZAI Collaborative Improvement Community🌟

 

NZAI is determined to keep the momentum going from our recent conference, as an independent, authoritative network. Building on our assessment work over the years – successful conferences, thought pieces on assessment, the publication and distribution of Assessment to Improve Learning – Principles, Practices and Proofs (PPP) – we are excited to announce our new initiative, what we’re now calling NZAI Collaborative Improvement Community.

NZAI invites you to join a collaborative network to problem-solve, contribute and develop proofs of progress through using assessment in its broadest sense.

So what’s the plan?

We at NZAI want to build positivity and energy into the national educational discourse by amplifying the improvement stories that we hear every year at our Assessment Conference. We know that these stories represent a small slice of the great things happening in NZ education, often invisible and buried within the national argumentative discourse.

Our vision is to celebrate, exemplify and build on the success stories of individual schools through the creation of a collaborative community of participating schools focused on school improvement. Our plan is to capture and present school stories of successful practice on a framework that will enable success to be highlighted and exemplified. Stories will be focused on intentional assessment and the formative use of data – what is to be improved, the change process, and the evidence of improvement – and will provide adaptable case studies. Participation will of course be voluntary, and will emphasise security and privacy.

We are aiming to publish an annual analysis of successful practices from the school stories and they will be presented on our website in due course.

NZAI is well placed to facilitate this, being non-partisan and representative across the education community. Our improvement methodology is research-based, designed around iterative improvement year-on-year, focussed on celebrating what works and appreciative inquiry.

What’s in it for you?

We see a range of benefits for schools and the profession, including:

• providing a national platform for schools to share their success stories
• motivating schools to initiate and build on their action-research processes through providing a space for ongoing investigation
• collaborative success building and problem sharing
• building connectivity and community among teachers and schools
• easy, cost-free participation
• networking and professional growth

As a politically neutral national education body, solely focussed on advocating for the use of effective assessment in all its forms, we can help build national positivity through creating a virtual community of schools that can celebrate what they have achieved and share and learn from each other about how to even better solve problems.

What are the next steps?

If you are interested and think this may well add value to you and your school, and help build positivity throughout education, please contact us at info@nzai.org.nz. 

We’ll then send you more information about how we’re planning for it to proceed, how you will actually participate, and more details about how we envisage the process over 2025 and the following years.

NZAI Assessment Conference 2025   A great two days at Ormiston Junior College!

 

Under the theme of 🌟Using assessment for better, smarter, faster learning🌟we were excited to bring together practitioners across the education spectrum to share wisdom, insights and best practices.

During the first week of the April school holidays, educators from across the sectors connected at Ormiston Junior College in Auckland to  listen and discuss all facets of assessment from the classroom through to the Ministry of Education.  We were teachers, school leaders, PLD facilitators, education agency personnel, university academics – all education professionals interested in discussing how effective assessment practice is a vital component of learning, teaching and system improvement.

• We listened to local experts workshop their tested theories of improvement
• We were challenged by a range of brilliant keynote speakers and panellists
• We heard how colleagues across schools/kura/kāhui ako have improved achievement trends despite changing government requirements.
• We connected with educators focused on using assessment to improve outcomes for all ākonga and expand their professional network.

Thank you:

• to all delegates who were interested to attend our conference, attentive to the issues raised by our speakers and workshop presenters.
• to our keynote speakers and workshop presenters, who made their knowledge and experience available to others so that we can add to the our growing body of understanding of what makes good assessment practice.
• to our sponsors, Evaluation Associates | Te Huinga Kākākura Mātauranga and MasseyUniversity who contributed in many ways to making the conference a success, 
• to Ormiston Junior College for generously allowing us to use the school as a wonderful venue, to NZCER for their ongoing support for NZAI and to The Conference Company for running our conference with their usual friendly and helpful efficiency.

Be aware that videographed keynote addresses and workshops will be on our website just as soon as we can get the technology sorted. All conference delegates will be sent a personalised link. 

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 Please feel free to dive into our archive of keynote addresses and workshop presentations from previous years. There’s a storehouse, in fact a treasure trove of illustrations of effective assessment practices that support improved learning.

 

And while you’re on our website, go to our publication Assessment to Improve Learning: Principles, practices and proof, distributed to all schools in 2021 and available online through the link.  You’ll be able to make connections with conference themes. 

Please don’t hesitate to be in touch if you have queries. Email us at info@nzai.org.nz.