25 November 2025
Ken Robertson
[FYI request #32682 email]
Official Information Request – Te Tiriti Partnership Standard
Tēnā koe Ken,
Thank you for your request under the Official Information Act 1981 request of 28 October 2025, as
follows:
Please provide any information, including emails, meeting notes, briefing documents, advice given
etc about the use of the phrase “Tiriti o Waitangi Partnership” in Standard One and its focus areas
in the 2026 standards.
I would like to know the following:
What is the teaching council’s definition of this term? Please give a definition that does not contain
the phrase “Te Tiriti Partnership” as in "A guide to the Standards and Focus Areas" on page 9, and
does not use the word "Partnership"
Why the phrase was chosen given the acknowledgment of the issues with it as shown on page 12
of that guide:
“It is acknowledged that a sole focus on partnership is not always the preferred formulation in
relation to the Te Tiriti. The usage of the full phrase “reflects Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership in New
Zealand” is interpreted as primarily emphasising the centrality of Te Tiriti to the identity, culture,
and political and legal framework of Aotearoa New Zealand. This phrasing is not intended to limit
any interpretation of the focus area that is genuinely focused on honouring Te Tiriti o Waitangi.”
Why Standard One was not called Te Tiriti o Waitangi Standard
Any feedback given on suggested changes to this standard which were not undertaken, and why
this feedback was not undertaken.
The first section of this response provides general information about the approach taken to Standard 1
of the 2026 Standards.
The second section identifies documents that fall within the scope of the first part of your request.
The third section directly addresses the questions that make up the balance of your request, in the
context of the general information in the first section.
1.
The approach taken to Standard 1 of the 2026 Standards
The Teaching Council had always planned to undertake a review of the 2017 standards for the teaching
profession in 2025, but the
Statement of Government Policy Relating to Teaching Council Functions issued by the Minister of Education in December 2024 impacted on the originally intended approach to
the review and the timeframe.
In all of the circumstances, the approach we proposed in the consultation document seeking feedback
on the proposed new standards was to leave Standard 1 unchanged from 2017. This included
continuing with the phrasing used in 2017, which was ‘Te Tiriti o Waitangi Partnership’.
The proposed Standard 1 received a generally positive response in the feedback on the proposed new
standards (as discussed further in section 3 below), with the main area of contention in in relation to
how to position it in relation to the three domains (professional knowledge, professional practice, and
professional engagement) and the ‘wheel’ diagram depicting the standards. This became a key focus of
our work in finalising the 2026 Standards.
In developing the final draft, we also decided to make further changes to the focus areas of Standards
compared with the 2017 elaborations, largely by bringing in text from elaborations that had sat under
other Standards.
There was no substantive discussion of the implications of using the “Tiriti o Waitangi Partnership” in
the 2026 Standards, given that:
• use of this phrase was a continuation of the usage in the 2017 Standards, and
• in the context of our approach of making minimal changes to Standard 1, we did not consider
that the ‘Partnership’ term was a significant area of contention in the consultation feedback.
2.
Documents within scope
For the reasons set out in section 1, there were very few documents within the scope of the first part of
your request, i.e. “about the use of the phrase “‘Tiriti o Waitangi Partnership’ in Standard One and its
focus areas in the 2026 standards”. We have interpreted this phrasing to mean documents that
considered the use of this phrase. We considered it would be neither feasible nor helpful to you to
simply include any document that used the phrase, since almost every document associated with the
2026 Standards project did so.
On this basis, therefore we are releasing the following two documents to you:
Date
Title
Redactions
26
Re: Pre consultation on
Email exchange
Some names and email
February
standards refresh
with NZEI Te Riu
addresses redacted for
2025
Roa
privacy reasons.
3 March
[redacted] replied to a
Email exchange
Name redacted for
2025
comment in "Standards
within the Teaching
privacy reasons.
Consultation doc v1"
Council.
The fol owing publicly available documents also fall within the scope of the first part of your request:
Document
Web address
A revised set of Standards
https://res.cloudinary.com/dwavcpl93/image/upload/s--
for the Teaching Profession:
LlM4CWEt--/Standards-for-teaching-profession-
Consultation document
consultation-document-2025_z7qfqm?_a=BAMAAAfm0
(March 2025)
Consultation on a revised set
https://res.cloudinary.com/dwavcpl93/image/upload/s--
of standards for the teaching
JM5miMps--/Standards-What-We-Heard-and-How-We-
profession: What we heard
Responded_gjp7jv?_a=BAMAAAfm0
and how we responded (June 2025)
A guide to the standards and
https://res.cloudinary.com/dwavcpl93/image/upload/s--
focus areas of the 2026
5dkxLssS--/Guide-to-the-2026-Standards-and-Focus-
Standards for the Teaching
Areas_but9gk?_a=BAMAAAfm0
Profession (October 2025)
3.
Responses to questions
What is the teaching council’s definition of this term? Please give a definition that does not contain the
phrase “Te Tiriti Partnership” as in "A guide to the Standards and Focus Areas" on page 9, and does not
use the word "Partnership"
2
The Teaching Council does not consider that it is within our purview to determine the definition of “Te
Tiriti of Waitangi partnership”. The quote on page 12 referenced in your second question makes it clear
that that there is scope for settings to define this in their own way, consistent with being “genuinely
focused on honouring Te Tiriti o Waitangi”.
Why the phrase was chosen given the acknowledgment of the issues with it as shown on page 12 of
that guide As discussed in section 1, the choice regarding the phrase was to continue the phrasing of Standard 1
used in the 2017 Standards. Some concerns came through in the consultation, although for differing
reasons.
The
Guide was written a few months after the 2026 Standards were finalised and the text quoted takes
account of some conversations about disappointment about the continuation of the “Partnership”
phrase that occurred after the 2026 Standards had been approved.
Why Standard One was not called Te Tiriti o Waitangi Standard
No consideration was given to calling Standard 1 “Te Tiriti o Waitangi’ or “Te Tiriti o Waitangi Standard”.
The approach taken with the draft standards, and confirmed when the 2026 Standards were approved,
was to continue the phrasing of Standard 1 used in the 2017 Standards.
Any feedback given on suggested changes to this standard which were not undertaken, and why this
feedback was not undertaken. The feedback on suggested changes to Standard 1 is summarised on page 9 of
Consultation on a
revised set of standards for the teaching profession: What we heard and how we responded (June
2025), in the following table:
Comment theme
Frequency
Strengthen the Te Tiriti standard
79
Don’t have a stand-alone Te Tiriti standard
78
General supportive comments
78
Comments about implementation and monitoring
57
Drafting/wording suggestions
52
Comments about workload, and need for resources and support
52
General critical comments
46
Leave the Te Tiriti standard unchanged
27
Contesting ‘partnership’ and/or the prominence of Te Tiriti
26
Comments about considering other cultures
24
Other areas should be prioritised
10
Support for Te Tiriti standard standing outside the three domains
8
Not elsewhere categorised
10
For context, a total of 1,642 consultation survey responses and 64 written submissions were received.
25 discussions took place with a mix of representative groups to gather verbal feedback.
Section 1 sets out the context and rationale for what changes were and were not made during the
finalisation of Standard 1.
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Thank you again for engagement on this important topic. I hope that this response has shed some light
on why we made the decisions we did during the period when the 2026 Standards were developed and
finalised. If you have any questions about this response, please feel free to reach out to Lead Advisor
Jess Ludgate via [Teaching Council request email].
You have the right to seek a review of this response by the Office of the Ombudsman. Information on
how to do so is available here: How to make a complaint | Ombudsman New Zealand
Nāku noa, nā
Clive Jones
Pou Kaiāwhā | Deputy Chief Executive
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