Head chef and co-owner of Wellington restaurant Margot, Tom Adam. Photo: RNZ / John Gerritsen
The hospitality sector fears the government's NCEA overhaul will worsen staff shortages and undermine its drive to grow the tourism industry.
It has written to Education Minister Erica Stanford urging her to change her mind on leaving hospitality out of the list of subjects available at Year 11.
Teachers and business owners told RNZ students learned basic kitchen skills in Year 11 and also got a taste for the subject.
Sam MacKinnon from Hospitality New Zealand said axing the Level 1 qualification could make the subject less attractive for students and prompt schools to put less resource and effort into it while they focused on "core" subjects.
He said that would damage the government's goals for growing the industry.
"Under the tourism roadmap work there's an expectation that we have more Kiwis involved in hospitality and tourism, but we've got some changes at the early end of that pipeline which really impacts our ability to build that pipeline of talent into the sector," he said.
Photo: 123RF
He said the sector was expecting an 8 percent staff shortage in the next five to 10 years.
"There's a challenge around how we fill those gaps and when we're being told that there's challenges around how many migrants we can get in to work we need to make sure we've got a really strong domestic pipeline to fill those gaps with New Zealanders," he said.
MacKinnon said Hospitality New Zealand had written to Stanford asking that Hospitality Level 1 be reinstated.
At Wellington's Margot restaurant head chef and co-owner Tom Adam said studying hospitality during Year 11 kick-started his career.
It was important to have a certificate that showed what students had learned at that stage of their schooling, he said.
"We're definitely looking for that. If I can look at someone's CV and I can be like 'unit standards level 1' I know you can pick up a knife, you can learn how to use it properly, you can know safety, you're going to know how to handle food properly - the sort of ABCs early on," he said.
"If someone's leaving school a bit early at least they'll have this qualification to show they have those basic things."
Mahurangi College hospitality teacher Isabel Rangiwananga said the proposed changes were significant.
"We've seen the removal of our Level 1 or Year 11 hospitality completely. We've seen hospitality move from a technology department into social sciences and we have no information as to why that move has been made," she said.
Rangiwananga said it could be hard to manage because the social sciences were classroom-based, but hospitality should be taught in a kitchen.
"It would pull hospitality teachers into probably two departments. Most of us are used to working in a technology department with other technology teachers. We may still be teaching some other technology subjects, but then for hospitality we would be crossing over into social sciences... It could be quite messy for schools to manage," she said.
The Education Ministry said the government had not yet made a final decision about removing NCEA Level 1, a move it said would reduce the number of years of high-stakes assessment "and enable students to focus on deep learning of foundational skills and knowledge in Year 11".
"We are in the process of considering and analysing feedback from consultation, to inform final proposals," it said.
"Regardless of the proposed changes, Hospitality has been announced as one of the senior secondary subjects. We want the new Hospitality subject to help students succeed in the sector and provide a pipeline of talent for the industry. It will be an industry-led subject for secondary school students and Hospitality industry representatives will be involved in developing the subject."
