Rangataua School may be polytech outpost

Ruapehu Bulletin, Volume 12, Issue 585, 9 May 1995, Page 1

Rangataua School may be polytech outpost

Rangataua School may become a poly technic outpost of Ruapehu College, if plans set in motion by acting principal Graham Parker come to fruition. He told the Bulletin last week work was currently under way to secure the lease on the property as well as gain Qualifications Authority certification for Ruapehu College to run courses in conjunction with Wanganui Polytechnic. Offered at Rangataua would be "non-conventional" work skills introduction courses. "The courses would be designed so that kids could move on from the college, through Rangataua and on from there, possibly to polytech," explained Mr Parker. He said the idea was to provide further education for young people who don't fit in with the college campus

system but whose families can't afford to, or who don't want to, send them out of town to a polytechnic college. Also targetted are people who perhaps left school too early and who now want to further their education. "They can come back (as adults) but without being in school with the rules designed for the kids." Mr Parker called for support from the community for the proposal. "We are still in the exploratory stages. We decided to secure the building and the opportunity while we could. Now we need the backing of the community to make it work." He said community support was essential as no extra funding would be available for it. An important incentive for making the proposal work

was the raising of the school leaving age to 17. Mr Parker said older pupils who were not academic in nature would have to be catered for more. The intention is to provide skills training for key local industries including forestry, agriculture, horticulture and tourism. "We' ve got to look ahead to what our educational needs are going to be in the future. We can't just look at 1995. Last week a small group of staff were working with education consultant Norman Pointer on the school's accreditation document for teaching "non-conventional" courses. ^ He said the aim was to gear up the school to^^r' provide work skills training for pupils while they jf)

were still at school. Some of that training would be the start of national certifica- ^ tion courses, which would give them

a head start in their careers. The process would put Ruapehu College ^

among the first collegestoachieve a certifica- ^0%.