Great ideas from schools

The ENZ Schools’ Reference Group was set up last year as a way to collect school feedback and ideas about how the sector can best develop. 

ENZ Business Development Manager Mary Camp says the latest meeting on 25 February generated a swag of suggestions for the professional development workshops held in the lead-up to the New Zealand International Education Conference (NZIEC). More are welcome…

“This reference group is really benefitting our work to support the industry,” Mary says. 

“Given there are so many schools, spread from one end of the country to the other, and with so much variety of character and programme, it can be hard for us to be sure we’re hearing what we need to hear from schools.”

“It’s great now to have an official channel open for that conversation, as well as the other connections we have through regional clusters and the like. We’ve been able to design services and products to suit schools’ current needs, and schools’ feedback on other parts of Education New Zealand’s work has been hugely valuable.”

Mary says the pre-conference workshops in 2013 (on business planning, social media and working with agents) were well attended and rated highly by participants. The aim is to keep relevance high for this year’s NZIEC –  held in Wellington on 21-22 August 2014. 

Additions to this ‘working topic list’ from the Schools’ Reference Group meeting are welcome:

• Collaboration – looking at different collaborative business models, eg regional, niche

• Homestay systems/ processes, building your homestay community, sharing ideas

• Alumni – using them effectively

• Agent perspectives – what are they looking for? (panel)

• Market analysis – including hard stats, competitor analysis, and recommended key markets for schools.