Randy Dueck

"It's an opportunity to get some good feedback and a better understanding of how our students are learning."  The comment made by Hanover Assistant Superintendent Randy Dueck following the release of an education study which compared academic performance levels among grade eight students across Canada.

The Pan-Canadian Assessment by the Council of Ministers of Education of Canada is designed to inform Canadians about how well their education systems are meeting the needs of students and society.  It tested all grade eight students in the country in mathematics, reading and science.

Dueck says the study, which shows Manitoba has the lowest grades of all the provinces, needs to be taken seriously.  "We need to look at the results, analyze them and get a sense of the perspective around them and then see what can we do to improve student learning.  At this point the data is pretty fresh and the data we have available to us is pretty general.  Minister of Education, Nancy Allan, has said they will take a closer look as the more detailed data comes out, they are going to look at it seriously and be responsive to the data."

Dueck emphasizes this is Manitoba data and does not get more specific.  "We don't know what the Hanover data is at this point.  We don't know if we are astoundingly beyond all other Manitoba averages, or below or the same.  But we believe Minister Allan is going to take it seriously and that's a good thing."

He adds Hanover has given middle years grades a lot of attention.  "We've done a great deal of work in saying how can we improve learning for our kids at those levels.  We have curriculum support teachers in place, we are developing our middle years philosophy, we are applying that to all of our middle years schools, we are learning what grading and reporting could and should look like at the middle years level.  We are talking quite seriously about what does engaged instruction really look like and does that mean that students are just doing what they are supposed to do?  Or does it mean their mental wheels are really turning and their creative juices are really flowing and there is real learning going on."

Dueck notes this is all data that Hanover has been collecting and working on for the last five years.  "What we always want to do is make sure our students in Hanover are always learning and they are getting the best education that we can possibly provide for them.  As far as comparing, we also have to keep in mind Canada does just as well as almost any other country in the world in terms of education.  So, if Manitoba is low on the Canadian average, what does that mean on the world average?  I think it's still very high and our results here in Manitoba would compare favourably to any state in the United States.  I think there is much good in here in terms of sorting out where we are at."