Failure in NZ Schools is not subjective.

Recent media from teacher unions in NZ has said that the idea of schools being failures is subjective.

We have approximately 460 high schools in New Zealand. This is a relatively small number and we ignore many of the solutions so as not to upset the adults in the room.

Here is a listing of the top 45 schools – and the bottom 45 schools – ranked by the percentage of their leavers with University Entrance in 2022.

While there will be many leaders and teachers trying hard in the bottom 45 they are locked into collective contracts and Ministry protocols that prevent genuine innovation. The unions – as well as denying failure – claim that parents have massive choice in NZ. You will notice that many schools in the bottom 45 are in single school locations where the “choices” available to parents are to homeschool or send their kids to boarding schools.

Codes are:
– EQI – The Ministry’s equity index – which applies risk factors to students and provides marginal extra funding to schools with more “at risk” students (i.e. a high EQI).
– To 17Yr – This is the retention of students within a school to 17 years of age.
– To degree – This is the percentage of students who leave a school and go into degree level study.

As so many say UE and degree study may not be the best for a student but school by school it is a good indicator of quality of outcomes for their students.

Alwyn Poole
Innovative Education Consultants
alwyn.poole@gmail.com
www.innovativeeducation.co.nz
alwynpoole.substack.com
www.linkedin.com/in/alwyn-poole-16b02151/