Posted 21/09/2009 at 3:28PM

The National Land Transport Programme 2009-2012’s primary focus is targeted investment to improve the efficiency of key transport routes, improve public transport and ease severe congestion in key urban areas and areas that contribute to economic growth.

The fund, worth $8.7 billion is allocated to 16 activity classes, one of which is demand management and community programmes.  The New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) funding focus for this activity class in 2009/10 is for programmes that significantly deliver on the Road Safety to 2010 strategy or achieve a change in travel behaviour that will reduce severe congestion in major urban areas.

NZTA will be reviewing their community programme activities to ensure value for money and will be looking at alternative future road safety education approaches for primary and intermediate schools. They are looking to find a more cost-effective way to offer the best possible safety outcomes for the largest number of schools.
The following NZTA national programmes have confirmed funding for 2010, but the level of funding beyond this time is yet to be decided:

• Practice
• Safe2Go
• Feet First/School Travel Planning
• Bike Wise
• Neighbourhood Accessibility Planning
• Foundation Certificate in Injury Prevention
• Tracks are for Trains
• Community resources and guidelines

RoadSense, a road safety education strategy delivered by Educating NZ to over 1500 primary and intermediate schools since 2002, was cancelled. There is now no national classroom-based road safety education programme other than what is provided by Police Education Officers.

Evidence suggests however, that safety education needs to be integrated into the regular classroom curriculum and provided over a number of years, rather than as one-offs:

“Teaching safety skills to children can provide lifelong benefits to society, but should be seen as a long term intervention strategy. Experience in many countries has shown that reliance on individuals or organisations visiting schools to give talks on road safety are not effective on their own. Children may remember the messages in the short term, but effective and sustainable development of positive attitudes towards road safety are best achieved by inclusion in the core curriculum, either as a compulsory subject in its own right or as a cross-curricular theme:” http://www.worldbank.org/transport/roads/safety.htm

The infrastructure and level of expertise that will now be lost through the axing of programmes like RoadSense is also of concern. Once decisions are made about ‘the most cost-effective way to offer the best possible safety outcomes for the largest number of schools’, this expertise may need to be redeveloped at additional cost.

Posted 21/09/2009 at 3:15PM

The Ministry of Transport’s 2020 Safer Journeys discussion document was released in August and feedback is sought from all New Zealanders. There are more than 60 initiatives outlined in the document and the public is invited to discuss which are the most important to adopt. Feedback received will be used to develop Safer Journeys, a road strategy for the next ten years.

The 2010-2020 vision is to set in place a system-wide approach to improving road safety. This ’safe system’ approach focuses on the outcomes to be achieved: safer roads and roadsides, safer vehicles, safer speeds and safer road use. This is intended to build on the previous 2010 strategy’s approach of the three E’s: education, engineering and enforcement.

Thirteen priorities have been outlined under three headings: areas of high concern, areas of medium concern, and areas for continued focus and emerging issues. Discussion points following the description of each priority provide opportunities for the public to respond.

Areas of high concern:

• Reducing alcohol/drug impaired driving
• Increasing the safety of young drivers
• Safer roads and safer roadsides
• Safer speeds
• Increasing the safety of motor-cycling

Areas of medium concern:

• Improving the safety of the light vehicle fleet
• Safer walking and cycling
• Improving the safety of heavy vehicles
• Reducing the impact of fatigue
• Addressing distraction

Areas for continued focus and emerging areas:

• Increasing the level of restraint use
• Reducing the impact of high risk drivers
• Increasing the safety of older New Zealanders

What do you think? Submissions can be made online at www.saferjourneys.govt.nz or emailed to saferjourneys@transport.govt.nz. The deadline for submissions is Friday 2 October.

Posted 21/09/2009 at 2:52PM

In the early hours of 28 August most of the Wellington-based staff at Educating NZ were rudely awakened by the rumbling and jolting of a 5.2 earthquake. Fortunately the large earthquake caused little damage, but it did remind us of the importance of being ready for a disaster.

Sadly, only one in ten households is fully prepared for a disaster. Nearly three quarters of those questioned knew what they needed to do to prepare for a disaster, but less than a quarter were fully prepared at home, and only a tenth was prepared at work and home, according to a recent survey by the Ministry of Civil Defence & Emergency Management.

There is no doubt that awareness about disaster preparedness is high, but too many of us don’t get round to converting that awareness into action.

Educating NZ is proud of our involvement in the development of What’s the Plan Stan, the Ministry’s disaster education resource for primary and intermediate schools. One of the main thrusts of this programme is that children will act as ’agents of change’ to ensure action is taken in their homes to be better prepared for disasters.

But despite our team’s awareness of disaster preparation from working on this project, we know that taking the step to turn that knowledge into action in our personal lives is easily put off.  And based on the statistics, it is likely that the same applies to 90% of the readers of this newsletter.

Disaster Awareness Week takes place this year from 11 to 17 October, so we issue a challenge to everyone to turn awareness into action with two simple steps:  

• Develop a household emergency plan for what your family should do in various scenarios (including if you are at work), safe places to shelter at home, where to meet, who’ll pick up the children and so on. There is a handy checklist on www.getthru.govt.nz
• Check that you have sufficient emergency survival items to cope for three days or more, and that you can find them easily in a disaster.  

 

Posted 15/09/2009 at 5:02PM

Janelle and David, the directors of Educating NZ, are promoting Educating Global in the United Arab Emirates.

They joined James Piecowye from DubaiEye, Dubai’s popular radio station, for a conversation about how to meaningfully implement road safety, health and wellbeing, and enterprise education into the UAE curriculum.

James Piecowye commented that Educating Global’s concepts are“very interesting and long overdue ideas that are anything but a transplant of another nation’s education.”

Listen to the podcast now by clicking play on the right hand link.

Posted 13/08/2009 at 8:54AM

Pupils at a Wellington school demonstrated recently that they knew what  to do before, during and after a disaster, as part of the launch ceremony for the revised What’s the Plan Stan disaster education resource.

Educating NZ undertook a project to revise the What’s the Plan Stan teachers’ guide, CD–Rom and website for the Ministry of Civil Defence & Emergency Management in order to align the resource with The New Zealand Curriculum and bring it up to date with best disaster education practice.

What’s the Plan Stan was launched at Clyde Quay School by Civil Defence Minister John Carter.  He took part in a lesson with year 3 and 4 children about earthquake safety and presented them with water–bottles for correctly answering quiz questions on the CD–Rom.  During the lesson Mr Carter participated in a mock earthquake drill with the children, dropping under a desk for shelter.

The resource has been sent to all primary and intermediate schools in New Zealand.

www.whatstheplanstan.govt.nz

Posted 11/08/2009 at 11:39AM

Around 30 central and local government and private sector friends and partners joined Educating NZ for lunch and to listen to Dr Mark Ahn of Victoria University presented his views on the innovative technology sector’s role in growing the wealth of New Zealand.

The topic built on Educating NZ’s leadership in enterprise education and support for the growth of human capital that will drive New Zealand’s social and economic success in the 21st century.

Mark presented both research and anecdotal evidence of the way innovative thinkers and effective management, supported by well directed research and development funding, can take great ideas and turn them into value–adding businesses.

His presentation was of great interest to all attendees and is likely to lead to follow–up sessions focusing on the education sector’s role in developing skills, attributes and competencies in young New Zealanders so that they can become the inventors, innovators, entrepreneurs and business managers who will succeed in the future.