Our education system is in a code red emergency.

We are failing our students, parents and educators yet we are unwilling to have constructive debate on the root cause. Hot topics like the structured literacy versus balanced literacy debate results in sensationalist biased headlines that deepen the ideological divide.

According to New Zealand's Auditor General, the Ministry of Education does not know why we have worsening disparities in educational outcomes for our richest and poorest neighbourhoods.

When we send our children to state schools to be educated by teachers who trained in taxpayer-funded tertiary institutions, we should expect that the training received by teachers and the education provided in state schools are following the evidence in the science of learning.

But when you speak to parents, educators and students, something is going terribly wrong.

To talk more on where, how and why we have gotten education wrong, I bring on Dr Nina Hood, a secondary school teacher who founded The Education Hub, an organisation that creates learning opportunities for teachers that bridges the gap between scientific research and everyday practice.

Dr Nina is also the academic director of The Teacher's Institute, a new education program for new teachers that puts the science of learning and in-classroom practical experience at the heart of teacher training.

Whoever wishes to foresee the future must consult the past; for human events ever resemble those of preceding times. This is a quote from Machiavelli about the importance of understanding our history.

Aotearoa New Zealand, like all nations, must grapple with its past if it intends to avoid repeating its mistakes. With the introduction of Act Party's Treaty Principles Bill, the discussion around Te Tiriti has come to a head. On one side of the argument, the current interpretation of te tiriti has gone too far, on the other, not far enough.

To understand this further, I wanted to learn more about New Zealand's history: how colonisation occurred, the context with which te tiriti and the treaty were signed, and the implication of what happened in the 1800s and how this affects people today.

So on this episode I bring you Professor Paul Moon, Officer of NZ Order of Merit. Paul is a historian and professor at Auckland University of Technology who has devoted his career to researching New Zealand History, Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and British Colonisation. He is an avid author and written many books on early NZ history and biographies of both British settlers and Maori rangatira.

I also speak to Paul about the recently developed NZ history curriculum as well as the state of our Universities and academia. Are we creating environments for freedom of thought, exploration and expression? Or has challenging the orthodoxy become a social faux-pas?

If you ask most people, a safe and just community is a key part of social cohesion.

People want safety to go about their business, certainty that there are consequences for bad actions and opportunities for both success and redemption.

But what does that look like?

A large topic of discussion is whether we are tough enough on crime. Are we doing enough to prevent crime and are we doing enough to mete out justice?

Rising social disadvantage, gang-related violent crime and intergenerational incarceration are complex issues that require deeper examination.

When recidivism is so high, can we say that prisons are working to keep us safer? Or are we asking prisons to do too many things?

On this episode I kōrero with Vaughan Winiata. Vaughan is a serial businessman, champion for Māori business and has spent the last several years working towards improving prisoner reintegration and gang member rehabilitation. Vaughan shares with us the reality of prison, the challenges inmates face on returning to society and why we even have prisons in the first place.