Who wrote the new curriculum? Experts say it wasn't them

Saturday, 18 July 2026

Kiwi education experts employed to write the new curriculum say they were effectively sidelined from the process, saying final drafts bear little resemblance to their work. The minister and the ministry don’t agree. Harriet Laughton reports.

“By Kiwis for Kiwi kids.”

Those were the words of Education Minister Erica Stanford at the announcement of the new national curriculum that will be soon be taught in years 1 to 10 in schools across the country.

But months on, former Ministry of Education curriculum writers say they have little understanding of who wrote the new curriculum, claiming little of their work survived into the final drafts.

Stanford and the ministry strongly dispute these claims.

Read more:

• Erica Stanford defends ‘coffee on Gold Coast’ before $2m education ministry contract

• Erica Stanford corrects written answer as questions mount over $2m curriculum deal

While the ministry maintains it retained ownership of the curriculum, official documents show Melbourne-based firm Learning First provided support, direction and input into the curriculum and sourced sample content.

The ministry told The Post Learning First was also helping to develop teaching and learning resources for years 9 and 10.

Labour's education spokesperson Ginny Andersen said the former writers' accounts raised serious questions about the Government's promise of a curriculum 'by Kiwis for Kiwi kids,“ questioning the extent of Learning First’s involvement in the curriculum in particular.

“When the very people meant to be writing the curriculum say they don’t know who actually wrote it, how can anyone have confidence in the minister’s claims it’s ‘by Kiwis for Kiwi kids’?”

“It’s a kick in the guts for Kiwi educators who have been sidelined, despite wanting nothing more than to give our kids the best possible start through education.”

But Stanford said Labour could not face the fact that “it got this so wrong”.

“In six years, it failed to produce an English or maths curriculum and lacked the courage to follow the evidence on structured literacy.”

Learning First founder Dr Ben Jensen said the firm had not written the curriculum and had not been involved for many months.

He said Learning First worked with many countries supporting work on curriculum reform and other areas of education policy.

“We supported the work in New Zealand in much the same way that we work with other countries: we provide advice on writing curriculum, benchmarking of curriculums across the world, and examples from different countries and so on.”

Ministry writers ‘excluded’

Former lead writer of the arts curriculum Dr Claire Coleman told The Post the final arts curriculum draft bore little resemblance to any of her work while at the ministry.

Although lead writers were told after the 2023 election that their existing drafts would be retained, Coleman said their influence steadily diminished.

She said academics and sector experts were increasingly sidelined, while she was excluded from meetings and 'kept busy' writing position papers that were never used and training staff who would eventually take over her role.

Those staff were not curriculum writers, she alleged, but were instead formatting 'an already finished product' that bore little resemblance to the writers' work.

Coleman joined the ministry as a lead writer in 2022, completing a draft of the arts curriculum under the Labour Government’s reforms.

Lead writers were proposed to be disestablished in the sweeping public service cuts made by the freshly elected National-led Government, however it was later announced they would be kept on.

Her work was put on hold after the election for five months while ministry staff took part in what Coleman described as 'thought experiment' work to help shape the Government's new direction.

When Stanford later announced a knowledge-rich curriculum informed by the science of learning, lead writers were told their drafts would still be used.

Coleman said they were asked to prepare position papers explaining how their work aligned with the new approach.

“It was a bit weird to be writing it after we'd all written our content, but the idea was that we would then have a really clear stake in the ground about what we were doing.”

Coleman spent months preparing the papers, however, an Official Information Act response later showed they were never progressed, approved or used in developing the draft curriculum.

“Nobody from the minister's office, or the minister, none of them really looked at our content at all, nor did they talk to us about our content, nor did we get real conversation about the research,” she said.

“It was just more a case of, you did it for the other [government], so we're going to get rid of you.”

Large writer groups were discontinued at the end of 2024 and replaced by small “contributor groups” made up of representatives from the sector to provide guidance, input and expert knowledge to the writing process.

In early 2025, Coleman was told her lead writer role would be disestablished and she could remain as a product designer.

She resigned instead, saying the new role reduced her to 'somebody that pushes things through' rather than shaping the curriculum.

Coleman lodged a formal complaint with Parliament's regulations review committee in May over the curriculum rewrite, demanding detail about the use of AI and Learning First in the curriculum.

She claimed writers were sidelined because education experts did not agree with the new direction for the curriculum.

“Realistically the use of an external contractor to do that writing is because they couldn't get well-regarded education experts in this country to do it, because they wouldn't go along with it, because they didn't agree with it.”

Coherence group had ‘large’ influence over curriculum

Coleman said the “coherence group,” played a large part in the writing process and fundamentally changed the hierarchy at the ministry.

The coherence group was established by the ministry in July 2024 to review and provide feedback on the updated curriculum

Coleman said following their establishment, writers were not trusted as subject experts who shaped the curriculum through robust discussion and negotiation, it was 'their way or the highway“.

“Everything had to go through the coherence group,” she said.

The ministry says the coherence group reviewed the curriculum against design criteria but had no decision-making authority.

At a select committee last year, the ministry’s deputy secretary for the curriculum centre Pauline Cleaver revealed that Learning First was involved in the coherence group, and had the opportunity “to feed in on most or all learning areas”.

Cleaver told The Post its founder Dr Ben Jensen attended some meetings from July 2025 but was not a formal member of the group.

Its involvement varied depending on the learning area, she said. In maths, Learning First did the international benchmarking, while in the PE component of health, it supported the ministry with trying to get “a much more explicit” description of the learning right.

Cleaver denied suggestions the ministry finalised or formatted work given to them by contractors.

“We took their advice on particular framing of curriculum. And then we made decisions based on what we know would mean that we had a knowledge-rich curriculum across each of the learning areas.”

‘No say’ over curriculum content

A former staffer, who wished to be kept anonymous, quit the ministry after it became clear writers had “no say” over the curriculum content following the appointment of the ministerial advisory group.

The group provided independent advice to the minister and operated before the coherence group was formed, reviewing the English, maths and statistics curriculum in particular.

“It became really clear that we were just given content from [the ministerial advisory group] and our job was just to tick it off, that we had no ability to protect or give feedback on it or anything.”

They alleged the English curriculum was done “entirely” outside of ministry writers, with no say over what the content would look like or or how it would change.

“If I'd stuck around, they would have happily continued to pay me just to sit there.”

Texts seen by The Post to the ex-staffer suggest controversial ministerial advisory group member Elizabeth Rata was brought back into the curriculum process after the draft had been completed.

“You are right to have jumped ship on MoE - sounds like they had a new, Rata-free curriculum all ready to go this week, but then minister decided she didn’t like it and has organised a big meeting next week where Elizabeth Rata is brought back in to ‘sort it’. Utter chaos. And a minister who clearly has zero political judgment.”

Rata is controversial for her critiques of kaupapa Māori education. She was one of seven University of Auckland academics who argued in a public letter in 2021 that indigenous knowledge 'falls far short of what can be defined as science itself'.

A ministry spokesperson said the curriculum was developed through an iterative process, including a number of groups and writers, maintaining the ministry had full ownership and accountability over it.

The staffer said the job cuts which saw nearly 200 roles cut from the ministry’s curriculum centre “completely gutted” it and came despite intensive labour needed in the curriculum overhaul.

They said staff who remained after the redundancies described the atmosphere as “deeply demoralising”.

According to the source, after they left they were told the English segment of the curriculum 'disappeared' for a period, coming back in a “very different form” with no clear understanding of who had written it when it reappeared.

Meanwhile two sources who were on “contributing groups” spoke to The Post on the condition of anonymity said their roles were largely reduced.

They said the curriculum that was put out for consultation was “completely different” from the one they worked on and spoke to a rushed process, with only around six months in their roles.

Learning First provide support, direction and input

Speculation grew over Learning First’s involvement in the curriculum when Stanford was corrected in a select committee by the ministry, who noted that the firm not only provided international benchmarking as Stanford had described, but also sourced content.

Correspondence with Stanford’s office and Learning First began a little over a year before the contract was signed with Learning First.

Cleaver told MPs in a select committee the reason Learning First did not undergo an open tender process is because it was already working with the firm.

Papers proposing significant reform to the curriculum process just one day after Learning First signed a contract with the ministry confirmed this.

The papers included detail over how Learning First was already working with the ministry, including advice from Jensen that the curriculum design needed to be improved to include more detail.

“We are focussing on this design now with Learning First’s support, direction and input,” Cleaver wrote.

The paper proposed significant changes to the writing process, increasing the role of the coherence group while decreasing the role of education sector experts in the coherence group, with Cleaver stating their involvement added “complexity”.

“Many members from the contributing groups were still focussed on a refresh of the 2007 curriculum and its competence-based approach rather than the development of a knowledge-rich curriculum,” Cleaver wrote.

In response to questions from The Post, Cleaver said the ministry had full ownership and accountability for the curriculum rewrite.

“The coherence group was not responsible for approving curriculum content and did not have decision-making authority over the curriculum. Responsibility for curriculum content remained with the ministry,” she said.

She said the ministry was responsible for its design, quality assurance and final content, which it then recommends to the Minister of Education, who signs off the final curriculum.

“Curriculum development is informed by New Zealand and international evidence and the ministry works with a range of people and groups throughout the process, with arrangements changing as curriculum work progresses.”

“The ministry uses a mix of permanent and fixed-term staff alongside contracted external expertise and additional capacity.”

“Some people and groups contribute to writing, some provide expert input, some review content, and some provide oversight.”

She said Learning First was contracted to provide an external perspective to ensure the curriculum aligned with global evidence and is comparable with high-performing systems.

Learning First provided some sample content, she said.

“This was just one of the inputs used by the ministry as part of writing the draft curriculum, alongside using New Zealand-based contributors and draft content developed under the previous curriculum design approach.”

She said workforce changes were in response to Government savings targets, not in response to the shift in curriculum design.

Labour has criticised the ministry’s involvement with Learning First after The Post revealed they were awarded a $2 million contract with no open tender process.

Andersen said the work could have been done closer to home and questioned whether a coffee between Stanford and Melbourne-based company Learning First’s founder Ben Jensen led to the $2 million contract being signed.

Shortly after, Stanford corrected a written Parliamentary question more than six months after it was lodged, revealing ministry staff were flown out to Australia specifically to meet Learning First.

Stanford, however, didn’t resile from criticising Labour’s efforts.

“Rather than engage with the substance, Labour is fixated on the false claim that one person wrote the curriculum - an obvious distraction from its own appalling record and from the fact that, for the first time in decades, student achievement is finally improving.”

She said the curriculum was developed from 2024 by eight ministry-led writing teams involving 184 New Zealand teachers, principals, academics, and subject experts, alongside the Education Review Office overview group, the coherence group and 47 sector insight members.

It was then put out for public consultation so every New Zealander could have their say, she said.

“Ginny Andersen does not want to debate the content because the curriculum has been well received and is already delivering results.”

“Labour would rather quibble over who wrote it than confront the reality that it presided over the worst literacy and numeracy results in New Zealand’s history.”