Education Minister Anne Tolley says she will sack the boards of primary schools which allow teachers to boycott the new national standards regime.
Boycotting the new programme would be against the law, she says.
Tensions over the new national standards in literacy and numeracy are increasing as the teachers' and principals' unions lobby school boards to support them in calls for a trial period before the standards are introduced nationally.
The unions have also threatened boycotts and industrial action and wrote to principals last week, urging them to call on school boards to voice the same concerns.
Mrs Tolley has ruled out a trial.
In "extreme" cases of boycotts she would have no choice but to dissolve the board and replace it with a commissioner, because the board would be refusing to obey the law.
"If, despite having that pointed out to them, they absolutely refused, I do have the power to dissolve the board and put in a commissioner.
"In the end, I would have to do that. I don't think it would come to that but if it went to the nth degree, I would do it.
"You just cannot have schools disobeying the law."
She said the Ministry of Education would give as much support as possible to boards stuck in a standoff with teachers.
However, she would not be backing down on her decision to put standards in place nationally from next year.
She said she had already made many changes in response to union concerns, but each time they had returned with more and she believed their arguments were now purely philosophical.
"That's why I'm putting my foot down.
"I've worked with the sector all year. We've made an enormous amount of changes based on that. I see this as bedding in next year.
"If there are changes needed, we will make them. I'm not saying this is it from day one. But we have to get started, because this is about kids failing in the system. I'll do whatever it takes to make this work."
Labour's education spokesman Trevor Mallard said Mrs Tolley was clearly now transferring her "battle" against academics and teachers to school boards.
"I'm surprised she's putting herself into that corner. She does have a choice. She can take a tiny step backwards and trial the system to get evidence that it's better than the systems already available."
Auckland University education head Prof John Hattie and a group of three other education academics have also called for a trial, concerned a hasty implementation will result in failure of the policy.
The School Trustees Association is broadly supportive of national standards and its president Lorraine Kerr wrote a stinging response to the Principals' Federation and primary teachers' union NZEI for telling principals to lobby their boards.
She objected to the unions' views of the policy, saying it was clearly "political" and most parents wanted clearer reports about their own children.
A meeting of 80 Northland principals last week unanimously agreed not to implement the standards until the impact was better known, as calls for a trial period strengthen.
- Claire Trevett
