What value was that

Back in September 2004, Deborah Coddington asked Trevor Mallard how much has been spent on facilitators for developing teachers to better teach literacy. The cost over the four previous years was over $32 million.

And for all that money spent on improving the teaching of literacy, we got a relative decline in the literacy skills of students from a world ranking of 13th to 24th. The Progress in International Reading Study shows that our average reading score has gone from 529 to 532, hardly a discernable movement.

And remember that the $32 million was just for facilitators for developing teachers. That figure does not include the costs of any new literacy programmes.