Labour and the Education Ministry’s ongoing failure of the poor.
Once again the “Matthew Effect” is in action – the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer.
Students in Decile 1-3 high schools in New Zealand have 1/3rd less opportunity to learn compared to students in the top 3 deciles – Decile 8-10. The average full attendance at Decile 1-3 is 41% and in the top three deciles 66%. And worse, the pattern over time is down (-3%) in attendance from 2018-2020 for Deciles 1-3 students, and up 3% for students in Decile 8-10 schools.
| Full attendence % | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 |
| NZ High Schools | |||
| Decile 01 | 40.3% | 36.9% | 35.7% |
| Decile 02 | 43.9% | 40.1% | 40.9% |
| Decile 03 | 46.0% | 41.3% | 44.8% |
| Decile 04 | 54.5% | 47.6% | 52.1% |
| Decile 05 | 54.6% | 51.2% | 57.0% |
| Decile 06 | 54.3% | 50.2% | 58.1% |
| Decile 07 | 60.8% | 57.6% | 64.0% |
| Decile 08 | 64.1% | 59.7% | 67.1% |
| Decile 09 | 68.2% | 64.8% | 71.4% |
| Decile 10 | 67.5% | 63.0% | 70.0% |
| Total | 57.8% | 53.5% | 59.4% |
The disadvantage across our system can also be shown through daily attendance. Even for our system as a whole in terms of per – day attendance at our schools – we have massive gaps between ethnicities, regions and deciles.
On the Monday before the latest long-down very close to 1 in 5 decile one students were not in school. For high decile schools only 1 in 10 was absent. On that Monday 92% of Asian students were at school 88 for European, 83% for Maori and Pasifika students. Auckland and Canterbury topped the regions whereas Te Tai Tokerau was the worst.
Daily figures are here:
We also have 80 high schools in NZ (I have the lists by school name) that have lost 30% of their students by their 17th birthday and 24 of those have lost 40% of their students.
All keep in mind that we have 10,500 students not even enrolled in school.
The input factors in education MUST be addressed by all political parties and by the Ministry responsible. Keep in mind the Ministry of Educations motto is:
“We shape an education system that delivers equitable and excellent outcomes.”
Even with UE the State failures are all too obvious. Private Schools students get UE at 81% (which is why Labour MPs tend to send their kids to them), State Integrated at 65%, State at 39%.
We are condemning many of the most in need to an adulthood with massively limited opportunities and very low aspirations and the demographics flow-on is in plain sight daily.
I have been working through a full data set that has information/rankings on every high school in New Zealand. A cart load of work but should be of high interest to policy writers and commentators. Not free but for anyone looking for high quality in depth data it will save many hours: alwyn.poole@gmail.com