New Zealand students' awareness of a local environmental issue

Abstract

One of the five ‘General Objectives of School Geography' of the Forms 5–7 Geography Syllabus for New Zealand Schools states that: ‘Geography students are encouraged to take a continuing interest in, and gain an appreciation of, the qualities and needs of the environment, seen always in relation to people's social and economic needs and values’. John Renner in his 1979 survey pointed out that: ‘Curriculum development should not take place without field studies of associated predispositions and competencies of pupils’ (Renner, 1979). His investigation with a sample of 352 North Island students disclosed the merits of such studies. However, there have been no substantive New Zealand surveys since. The current survey examines some aspects of students' awareness of a local environmental problem in and around the Tamaki Estuary on the eastern side of the Auckland metropolitan area.