All our young people need the fundamental skills and creative thinking capabilities to develop the adaptability and resilience they will need in the future.
The Southern Initiative is an example of a place-based initiative that aims to set children up for life with the best start and a pathway for further education and training.
For Auckland to succeed, attention needs to be focused not only on creating excellent learning opportunities for all our children and young people, but also on preparing everyone for a changing economic environment that will require continuous upskilling.
Whether in school, in the home, at work or within the community, it will be even more important to acquire knowledge, master methods of learning and build social skills.
These skills assist individuals to gain and keep good employment, to be personally fulfilled and to participate fully in the wider society.
Some Aucklanders are thriving but others are not. (For more on this, see Educational achievement of Auckland's children and young people.)
Particular focus is required to lift the educational achievement and skill development of those most in need, which includes groups who consistently experience poorer education and employment outcomes.
Trades training, apprenticeships and retraining options will continue to play an essential role in people getting the right skills to succeed. There needs to be a variety of development opportunities, that will reduce barriers to achieving meaningful employment and high-wage jobs, at every stage of life.
All Aucklanders deserve the chance to achieve great things.
We must ensure that all of our people have the tools they need to build a bright future, through a mix of informal learning options, paired with quality formal education and general personal development.
How this can be done
We can do this through:
- training and education initiatives focused on those most in need
- encouraging a culture and practice of lifelong learning and skill development
- supporting early childhood learning
- enabling opportunities to build soft skills
- supporting education-to-work pathways, apprenticeship and internship programmes
- providing appropriate education infrastructure
- retraining opportunities and digital literacy programmes.
