An international study shows that children in New Zealand have a high level of access to information communications technology at school. Education Minister Steve Maharey said an OECD report Are Students Ready for a Technology-Rich World rated New Zealand secondary school students fifth out of 41 countries for access to ICT such as computers and the Internet. The report found that New Zealand 15 year olds' access to ICT in home and school was the fifth highest of participating countries at nearly 100 percent. New Zealand students also ranked highly for their confidence with Internet tasks (8th) and higher-level ICT tasks such as managing databases and building web pages (6th).
Teachers have been using ICT in new ways at school ranging from making videos to desktop publishing after measures introduced by the government in 2000. Every school in the country now has access to broadband and ICT equipment and more than 600 schools are involved in ICT clusters. These are results schools can be proud of,'' Mr Maharey said.
The government had invested $300 million in ICT in schools since 2000. This year schools would receive $50 million specifically for ICT over and above the $22 million provided as part of their operational grants.
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