Committee email: 
nzsaedcom@gmail.com
Our purpose
We aim to improve the quality of statistics education at all levels within New Zealand. This supports the mission of the NZSA to lead New Zealand to value and make intelligent use of statistical thinking and good statistical practice.
Our main goal is to positively influence statistics education by providing leadership that consists of expert advice and advocacy for change.
Overall we want to:
- cooperate and collaborate with key stakeholders
- maintain a high profile across key stakeholders
- maintain our currency in statistical best practice and statistics education research
- proactively seek out and assess new opportunities for statistics education.
Expert advice includes:
- providing expert guidance in statistics education
- using and sharing ideas, experience and expertise within statistics education
- regularly reviewing the implementation of the statistics strand within the mathematics and statistics learning area of the New Zealand Curriculum, associated national qualifications, and other learning areas that contain statistical ideas, for example, biology, psychology, social studies, geography, general science, and physical education.
Advocacy for change includes:
- identifying gaps and finding ways to bring about change
- promoting the importance of statistics education
- promoting and communicating future trends in statistics education
- monitoring statistical education activity
- feeding forward and feeding back to support transitions across the different education sectors.
The Education Committee’s annual reports, from 2009, are available at https://www.stats.org.nz/archive/
NZSA also has supported the biennial conferences of the NZ Association of Mathematics Teachers (NZAMT) by helping to fund speakers in statistics education. It has done this since 1999. See below.
The committee supports our Aotearoa New Zealand online journal Statistics and Data Science Educator, SDSE, https://sdse.online It contains peer reviewed lesson plans for teachers at all levels.
The Committee welcomes contact from the statistical education community. If you wish to bring issues to our attention, please contact us through our email address.
CensusAtSchool
The Committee is interested in the many issues that confront teachers, and has written its thoughts on some of these. On the website CensusAtSchool New Zealand – TataurangaKiTeKura Aotearoa, click Resources, scroll down to the very bottom left and you’ll find our statements at NZSA Education Committee – CensusAtSchool New Zealand.
We hope that teachers see the CensusAtSchool site as the main go-to place for up-to-date ideas on the teaching, learning, and assessing of Statistics.
Here are the recent postings:
2022:
Vocational Pathways and Statistics (May 2022)
Curriculum Refresh and Statistics: Specific changes (March 2022)
Links with statistical or modelling content about Covid-19 (2022)
A guide to recently created statistics resources for Aotearoa New Zealand (2022)
2021:
- Time Series.
Teaching time series in our covid-affected era
- A vision for statistics and data science education at the senior secondary level in Aotearoa New Zealand.
Statistics and data science at CL7/8
2020:
- Links with statistical or modelling content about Covid-19.
https://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resources/ . Under ‘Enrichment and promotional’, see ‘Covid-19 documents’.
2019:
- External NCEA assessments in Statistics 2018
- Statement to NZQA about AS91035, AS91264 and AS91582 clarifications and student exemplars
A statement for the Ministry, and other stakeholder groups, about ensuring that mathematics and statistics has substantial options in the new NCEA system.
- Learning Area and Subjects in Mathematics and Statistics
- Kim Hill on RNZ on Sat 7 Sept 2019 10.05 am and 31 Aug 11.40 am: David Spiegelhalter, Hadley Wickham:
Quoted in: https://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/the-art-of-stats-sir-david-spiegelhalter/
2018:
- Topics for NCEA Review from NZSA Education Committee:
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/2018/03/20/ncea-review-from-nzsa-education-committee-march-2018/
- Literacy for University Entrance:
- A response to the Ministry’s ‘six big opportunities’:
Also in the last link is the NZ Mathematical Society Education Committee submission, and our endorsement of it.
2017:
https://new.censusatschool.org.nz/2017/
- The future of statistics in work and life
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/2017/03/13/statistics-in-school-and-the-future-of-work/
- Digital Technologies Hangarau Matihiko and Statistics
2016:
https://new.censusatschool.org.nz/2016/
- Maximising the benefits of statistical learning in schools, available in
2015:
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/issues-in-level-2-ncea-use-statistical-methods-to-make-an-inference-as-91264/
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/response-to-the-2014-nzqa-external-assessments/
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/review-of-e-asttle-assessment-tool-statistics-in-the-new-zealand-curriculum/
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/2015/04/14/response-to-ramp-from-nzsa-education-committee/
2014:
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/issues-in-level-3-ncea-statistics-internal-assessment/
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/ethics-in-statistics/
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/resource/statistical-education-day-nzsa-conference-2014/
http://new.censusatschool.org.nz/2014/06/06/statistics-forum-nzamt-2013-statistics-education-what-resources-do-we-need/
Education News
News from the Educational Committee is published in the NZSA newsletter: https://www.stats.org.nz/newsletter/.
NZSA and NZAMT Conferences
The NZSA has supported the New Zealand Association of Mathematics Teachers’ Conference through the sponsorship of the following invited and Plenary speakers:
| Date & Location | Speaker |
|---|---|
| 2022 (New Plymouth) (Delayed from 2021) | Chris Wild, University of Auckland Michelle Dalrymple, Cashmere High School |
| 2019 (Wellington) | Anna Fergusson, Universiity of Auckland |
| 2017 (Christchurch) | Christine Franklin, American Statistical Association and University of Georgia (USA) |
| 2015 (Auckland) | Robert Gould, University of California, Los Angeles (USA) Richard de Veaux, Williams College, Massachusetts (USA) |
| 2013 (Wellington) | Chris Wild, University of Auckland Allan Rossman, California Polytechnic University (USA) |
| 2011 (Christchurch) | Helen MacGillivray, Queensland University of Technology |
| 2009 (Palmerston North) | Cliff Konold, University of Massachusetts (USA) |
| 2007 (Auckland) | Maxine Pfannkuch, University of Auckland |
| 2005 (Christchurch) | Helen Chick, University of Melbourne |
| 2003 (Hamilton) | Jeff Witmer, Oberlin College (USA) |
| 2001 (Wellington) | Gail Burrill, Former President of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (USA) |
| 1999 (Dunedin) | Jane Watson, University of Tasmania |