Hybrid @ Hagley

“Our unique Hybrid @ Hagley model combines the best of both worlds: in-person learning at our kura and online learning via scheduled video calls.’

https://hagley.schoolpoint.co.nz/courses/course/12hh

There’s been a lot of media coverage recently devoted to covering the news that Hagley Community College in Christchurch, NZ, is going to be piloting a hybrid learning pilot in 2025 for a cohort of level 2 NCEA students. The College has been monitoring the data around attendance, participation, completion rates and from that, decided that they needed to create an opportunity for some students that didn’t involve attending school for every day of the week.

Earlier, as part of their design process, I was asked to review the programme structure they were seeking to implement, and ended up having some really useful conversations about both the structure they were designing and the rationale for taking this step in the first place. The reasons for deciding on this approach included:

1. Addressing falling attendance rates: The school hopes that offering a more flexible learning option will target students who may be struggling with regular attendance.
2. Providing innovative educational options: Hagley College prides itself on offering innovative and effective educational choices for both secondary and adult students.
3. Offering flexibility: The pilot will allow some students to work from home two days a week, providing a more flexible approach to achieving NCEA Level 2.
4. Developing community links: The hybrid learning pilot aims to provide students with opportunities to learn beyond the school environment and develop connections with the local community.
5. Catering to diverse student needs: Hagley College emphasises its ability to accommodate various learners, including those who may have faced barriers to education in the past.
6. Alignment with the school’s vision: The pilot supports Hagley’s goal of helping students achieve their full potential and develop necessary skills for their future endeavors.

As someone who had researched the responses made to the emergency remote learning during the COVID pandemic, and subsequently looked at how the concept of providing more hybrid learning approaches might help establish a more resilient schooling system, I was intrigued by what Hagley are doing, and supportive of the fact that they are taking an iterative approach by establishing this as a pilot, providing them with an opportunity to test the hypothesis they have made about addressing the things listed above.

Having lived most of my life in Christchurch I am very familiar with the various approaches they have taken to creating innovative programmed designed to motivate and engage learners, and the work that has gone into developing the College as a designated character school, and Many students come to Hagley after experiencing barriers to their education, and the school currently offers lots of flexibility in learning via night classes, part-time study, and adult enrolments. The hybrid learning programme is aligned with their designated character and is designed to meet the needs of a specific group of students. Ideally, they do want all students at school every day, but this is not realistic for a small group of students that have been identified for this pilot. Nathan Walsh, the head of e-Learning at Hagley was reported explaining all of this in a recent interview with the Christchurch Press.

A couple of days ago I was interviewed by Heather Du Plessis-Allan on her drive time slot on ZB radio. The interview was pretty much what you’d expect, with Heather asking the sorts of questions that may have been on the minds of listeners – sometimes taking the ‘devils advocate’ role to elicit a better understanding of what is being proposed.

It wasn’t quite the same in the interview earlier on the same day with Kerre Woodham speaking with Auckland Grammar Headmaster, Tim O’Connor. Tim acknowledged Hagley’s decision to pursue whatever approach they chose, but was emphatic in his personal view that the focus on resilience and wellbeing is not the way to go, claiming that our young people are becoming too fragile. He argues that what is needed is a greater emphasis on getting students back to school where they can be more closely monitored by staff and be taught the benefit of conforming to the structures that a day at school provides.

These words appear to have resonated with Kerre who enthusiastically supported the idea of having all students at school all of the time – even suggesting that having boys at home with their mothers may be detrimental to their personal development (quoting social justice advocate Celia Lashlie). It would appear that there’s even strong support from the deputy prime minister on this who regards Tim as a true education hero.

New Zealand isn’t alone in this area. Across the ditch in Australia similar debates have been going on, with Victorian shadow minister for education Matthew Bach – a former teacher – quoted as saying; “What the growing number of children who refuse to attend school need most is tough love. Going to school must simply be non-negotiable.” Christine Grové, Fulbright Scholar and Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Monash University, disagrees, and provides some suggestions about what could work in this article. In the UK advice to address school anxiety and refusal has been made available to parents and educators.

The issue here really is a clash of core beliefs and values – with all sorts of research available to support whatever perspective you might claim. I explored some of this thinking in a recent blog titled A tale of two principals, in which I attempted to illustrate the influences that shaped our current model of schooling, and how we need to be reflecting on the foundations of our own beliefs and the expectations we have of schools and schooling as a result. The point I made in that blog is that we must stop engaging in these sorts of debates with a binary mindset, and be prepared to explore new and different approaches to motivate and engage learners where existing efforts are patently failing some learners.

The beliefs we have about the value or benefit of online learning, for example, are often based purely on our own assumptions and not necessarily by evidence. I’m sure most would agree with Tim O’Connor that being in the same place and having opportunity to learn in-person may be an ideal here (even Nathan Walsh agrees with that) but to then assert that online forms of learning are of no value seems a bit of an over-play. But try telling the 27,000 students enrolled with Te Kura, the 18,000 extramural students enrolled with Massey University, or the 35,000 students enrolled with the Open Polytechnic that their experience of learning isn’t valuable. Now I’m sure that a very large percentage of those students would prefer to study face to face it they had the opportunity, but the fact for them is that their circumstances don’t allow that. And within each of those numbers there will be people, like the students identified at Hagley, for whom various forms of mental or physical health challenges mean they’d prefer not to have to attend in-person classes and so can achieve their educational aspirations in an alternative manner.

Even Tim O’Connor acknowledged the value of an online approach during the COVID response in his school. He says in his introduction to the May 2020 edition of the school’s Ad Augusta magazine (emphasis mine):

Auckland Grammar School has never promoted digital learning or permitted the open use of devices on campus (and nor will it in a hurry). Nevertheless, the School responded to the circumstances at hand by utilising the e-learning systems that were already in place, alongside the skills and expertise of quality staff members – teaching and non-teaching – who used these systems to teach online classes in unabated fashion. Rightfully, this has been a revolutionary step forward from the 1948 correspondence work and radio broadcasts.

A view supported by his Board Chair who wrote:

We are indeed fortunate that the Senior Leadership Team and teaching staff began trialling online learning some time ago. This has put us in a very strong position to respond, and to continue providing quality education through an online platform.

So back to the Hagley pilot – this isn’t going to be an open invitation to any student to choose not to attend school every day. The staff putting this programme together have been very focused on designing an approach that they believe will improve the chances of success for a small cohort of learners – just 20. The decision to focus on level 2 of NCEA is because the evidence is clear that students who achieve NCEA level 2 go on to have better life outcomes, and the school is thus attempting to meet the needs of a small group of students who may otherwise be lost to education.

The Hagley staff a very well aware of the potential pitfalls of providing such levels of independent study for learners, and the inherent possibility of this being abused by some which is why they have put a lot of thought into the process of onboarding students for the programme. Before being able to participate, the staff will hold interviews with all students and their parents. If students are not considered to be the right fit for the programme, (and/or the programme does not fit the student), they won’t be accepted. Student participation and engagement will be monitored closely, and, just like any class at Hagley College, if this isn’t happening, changes will be made on a case-by-case basis which may see some students required to return to five days of school learning.

So as the debates continue on – and I’m sure they will – let’s take some time to consider some of the bigger questions we need to be engaging in more fully, including;

• Can our claims of enforcing school attendance for every student be supported by strong education, health and social research and evidence?
• What are the possible negative consequences of, on the one hand, an authoritarian requirement for school attendance, and on the other, the freedom to enjoy greater flexibility in terms of where learning takes place?
• What are the root causes of the increase in student anxiety – and how best should this be addressed? Is it the responsibility of education to ‘fix’ or should other groups and agencies (including parents) be a part of the solution finding?
• If factors such as motivation and engagement are so important for academic achievement, what other options should be explored for increasing motivation in learning?