BSLA | University of Canterbury, Leadership workshop for Principals: 27th August 2025

Lead for Learning:  Leading the Better Start Literacy Approach for structured literacy teaching within your school.

Professor Gail Gillon and her team will support you in understanding effective leadership strategies to enable the sustainability of excellence in structured literacy teaching across years 0 – 8 throughout your school.

This workshop is intended for principals and senior school leaders that are currently implementing BSLA, who are not enrolled in our current PLD UC Online Course but would like to gain insight into the BSLA teaching in Years 0 – 8.  Professor Gillon will draw upon the latest UNESCO Global education monitoring report: Leadership in education: Lead for learning. She will contextualise key findings from this report in relation to leading effective and sustained change in structured literacy teaching.

Dr Scott, Dr Vosslamber, Dr Furlong and Dr Mark Lavenia, leaders within the BSLA PLD, will provide an overview of the BSLA assessment and teaching content across Years 0 – 8, and support your understanding of excellence in both assessment and teaching practices within structured literacy teaching.

Professor Gillon has recently been appointed as the New Zealand UNESCO Commissioner for Education. Within this role, she has analysed UNESCO’s latest Global education monitoring report: Lead for learning, gaining insight into successful global education leadership initiatives and leadership challenges in education around the world. Professor Gillon is an experienced leader in education. She was Pro Vice chancellor for the College of Education at the University of Canterbury from 2007- 2017. In this role she was part of senior leadership team that successful led several significant changes in teaching and assessment practices within the University in the post-earthquake period. She is the Founding Director of the Child Well-being Research Institute (2018- to current), Co-lead developer of the Better Start Literacy Approach (BSLA) and a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand.

We hope you can join professor Gillon and her team for an interesting and informative day focused on leading sustained excellence in structured literacy teaching. We will provide leaders the opportunity to network with and learn from each other’s experiences in this significant initiative in structured literacy teaching across the primary school years.

Date:  27 August 2025

Time: 9.30am – 3.00pm

Location: Novotel Christchurch Airport, 30 Durey Road

Lunch provided- Parking validated when parking in the long stay parking behind the hotel.