Act Party leader David Seymour is concerned the Government is using race at the centre of education.

He's taking aim at Ministry of Education's programmes, including Te Hurihanganui, addressing racism in the education system and improving outcomes for Māori learners and their whānau.

Seymour says he wants to know why it's teaching primary school children about white privilege.

"The Ministry of Education is saying that students should be profiled by race and made to apologise for their racial background. It's astonishing stuff."

His comments come after a student at a Whangārei primary school had to stand up in front of their classroom and say what they had done to acknowledge their white privilege.

But advocates of strategies to "de-colonise" Aotearoa's classrooms say rather than "racialise", such topics actually help dismantle the systemic racism that already exists, and holds back non-Pākehā students, particularly Māori.

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