Govt spends $2.5 million to teach NCEA literacy and numeracy
Morning Report, 1 November 2024
The government is spending $2.5 million on extra teaching for teenagers struggling with NCEA literacy and numeracy tests. Secondary Principals' Association president Vaughan Couillault spoke to Ingrid Hipkiss.
Listen to the interview here.
Who wants to be a teacher these days? Half as many signing up as in 2010
Newstalk ZB, 18 September 2024
New Zealand doesn’t seem to be the only country with a looming shortage of teachers.
The Teaching Council's highlighting data that shows the number of students graduating as teachers has dropped by more than a third.
Half as many people are signing up to become teachers as there were in 2010.
Secondary Principals Association President Vaughan Couillault told Mike Hosking he's been hearing similar reports overseas.
He says he's been told in Australia and the United Kingdom, exactly the same thing's happening.
New NCEA Level 1 standards adding to workload for teachers and students
RNZ, 16 Sep 2024
Some schools are finding changes to the first level of the national school qualification harder to work with than the old version.
But others think it is an improvement.
From this year, NCEA level one has fewer achievement standards available in each subject, but the content is broader.
Subjects now have four level-one standards - two internally assessed, two externally assessed - each worth five credits. Students must achieve 60 credits to receive a level-one certificate.
The changes were designed so students learned more content in each subject rather than concentrating on the content of just a few standards, and to reduce the workload of teachers.
New Zealand was one of the few places in the world where the national school qualification was offered at three senior-year levels; most countries assessed students in just one or two years.
But the first year of NCEA was optional, and about a quarter of schools had stopped offering a full level-one programme, preferring to concentrate on levels two and three or to provide an alternative qualification for their Year 11s.
Some teachers said level one was valuable for struggling learners, who needed to experience success before they attempted the more difficult NCEA levels.
Others believed level one was essential for crowd control, giving otherwise fractious Year 11s something to focus their energy on.
Figures showed last year 11% of school-leavers had only NCEA level one; 73% left school with level two or three.
Secondary Principals’ Association president Vaughan Couillault told RNZ the new standards were proving to be a lot more work for both students and teachers.
He said each standard included a lot of content and because there were fewer standards, teachers had less flexibility.
“Fewer, larger sounds good. Less assessment for students, fewer high-stakes situations, less marking for teachers. This all sounds good.
“But actually, what we’re finding is those significant pieces of work are intimidating for many students. They’ve actually become higher stakes, because there’s far more credits and far more investment involved in them.”
Couillault said though teachers did not mark the externally assessed standards, they had to organise online assessments or send off students’ work to the Qualifications Authority for marking.
“They’re proving to be particularly burdensome and increased workload for teachers and so I think there’s quite a lot of work to do, not only on the context, but also whether those five-credit chunks are the right size or whether we need to change those again before we start progressing with level 2 and level 3.”
Whangaparaoa College principal Steve McCracken told RNZ the school this year was again offering level one after students told staff they felt unprepared for level two exams and assessments.
“What we were hearing from our learners specifically is that they weren’t ready to have those high-stakes examinations or assessments in level two without having that level one preparation prior. So it was a learner-based decision to try and give them the best chance of achieving.”
McCracken said change was difficult, but overall feedback from heads of department was that the new level-one standards were an improvement.
Teachers felt like they were doing more teaching and less assessment, he said.
“In some of our curriculum areas, the feedback that we’ve had from our heads of curriculum area is that the reduction of the assessment actually allows a lot more teaching of the curriculum area, rather than that focus on assessment that it was previously.
“So, as a school, we’re quite happy with where we’re at despite the change being quite difficult and challenging at times,” he said.
Kaitaia College principal Louise Anaru said introducing the standards was more work for teachers but they expected the new assessments would eventually reduce workloads.
“With the old NCEA qualification ... there were so many standards, many teachers were over-assessing and of course that increased workload and also stress for our students.”
Anaru said teachers believed the new standards would better prepare students for further study.
St Patrick’s College Wellington head of science Doug Walker said it was too early to know if the new level one was an improvement.
“Some of the standards seem to work really well, but there have been very clear problems, particularly around the instructions for assessment for them that have left some teachers quite confused over the conditions under which they are assessing their students and that’s been really tricky to deal with.”
There were two achievement standards for each of the science disciplines and four generic science standards, he said, and schools were still figuring out how best to use those standards to create a good programme of study.
The new level one could be judged a success if students learned the content necessary to continue their subject at higher levels - and that would not be clear until next year, he said.
Many of the new standards seemed to have higher literacy requirements than the previous standards.
Changes to achievement standards for levels two and three of the NCEA have been postponed until 2028 and 2029.
Students allegedly missing out on free school lunches because staff eat first
Newstalk ZB, 13 Sep 2024
Children are allegedly missing out on free school lunches because staff are eating them first.
A parent of students at Tuakau College says her children have missed out for a month, coming home hungry. The students were also denied access to a phone to request their mother bring them food.
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says he has asked the Ministry of Education to investigate.
Secondary Principals Association President Vaughan Couillault tells Heather du Plessis-Allan the lunch program has a level of trust involved due to its scale and that teachers may have misinterpreted how it functions.
Spike in enrolment fraud at Auckland schools — principals head
1 News, 22 August, 2024
A secondary school principal says some Auckland schools are experiencing a "massive spike" in the number of students being fraudulently enrolled — with some parents going to great lengths to attempt to cheat the system.
The issue was recently highlighted at Auckland's Macleans College, where nine students in the last year were reportedly kicked out after it was discovered they had been fraudulently enrolled.
The NZ Herald reported the discrepancies were discovered after the school decided to do a "blanket request" for power bills to verify the addresses of the roughly 700 students enrolled since July last year.
Secondary principals' association president Vaughan Couillault told Breakfast this was not an isolated incident, and would continue as long as the population in Auckland continued to increase.
"What we've got is a situation where, as we all know, there was some significant immigration last year, and that's flowed on to some more secondary students this year. My area of expertise is obviously in secondary, but I'm sure it is occurring in primary too.
"We've got in particular regions of Auckland, significant roll growth where schools are increasing by 300 to 400 students over 18 months."
Secondary principals' association president Vaughan Couillault. (Source: 1News)
He said the problem spanned from parents simply lying, right through to purchasing property and moving in for a short period of time to enrol their students before moving out again.
"One's very fraudulent, in that your just lying on a piece of paper, the other one is if you have means, you're sort of buying an 'address of convenience' when purchasing in a particular zone. Or renting, so renting in a school zone, get your enrolment sorted and move back out to the property where you live after a few months."
"For those of us experiencing a massive spike in this sort of activity, we're having to employ specialists and that comes at a cost that is not being put back into the classroom."
Lengthy process to remove students for wrongful enrolment
Couillault said it was "about a two-to-three-month process" to identify the problem, gather evidence, and present that to the board and parties involved, as he said the board made the final decision to unenrol students, not the principals.
He said there was "no real provision" in the Education Act — where the enrolment zones were crafted from — for parents who attempted to enrol their child in a school close to where they work for their own convenience.
"For every one of those parents who have behaved fraudulently, they do have a school that the[ir child] is in zone for that they can go to. So they're not being denied an education option, they're just not being able to go to the one they want to because it's more convenient or whatever.
"Everyone pretty much lives in an 'in zone area' to a local school and freedom of choice in the education market isn't quite where people want it to be, but the provision of a public good is a complicated thing so that's why it is why it is."
Education Ministry considers increased support for NCEA tests
1 News, 8 August 2024
The Ministry of Education says its considering options to increase support to high schools rolling out the new NCEA tests, with an announcement expected by the end of the year.
"The Ministry of Education and NZQA recognise the addition of the co-requisite requirements to NCEA has increased the amount of work for schools to administer the qualification," Ministry of Education acting general manager Claire Eden said in a statement.
Results for the NCEA co-requisite tests for reading, writing and numeracy carried out in May and June were recently released, revealing poor student achievement.
Just under half of the approximately 74,500 students who participated in the latest round of the tests were in Year 10, NZQA stated.
Under half of students achieved the numeracy requirement at 45.6%, a drop from the last round of the test in 2023
Reading results were slightly better than last year, with nearly 58.7% of children passing
In writing, achievement slightly improved from last year at 55.7%.
Secondary Principals' Association vice president Louise Anaru said: "It's very concerning but, at the same time, it's not surprising — it is the first year of implementation... of course we have the new NCEA qualification, it's more challenging, robust, credible and New Zealanders called for a strengthened literacy and numeracy assessment."
In a statement, NZQA deputy chief executive Jann Marshall said the overall picture showed students were achieving better in reading and writing than in numeracy.
Anaru called for assessments to be marked quicker by NZQA and for schools to receive greater feedback on assessments, to improve learning preparation for the next round of testing if a student didn't pass.
She also called for schools to be resourced adequately to prepare and deliver the assessments.
"To resource our principals' nominees — those are the people in the school that oversee NCEA and now they're also spending a lot of time planning and also implementing the CAA (Common Assessment Activity) testing effectively."
Anaru said increased funding was also required for schools to be able to hire exam centre managers, relief teachers and supervisors for students sitting the tests.
The Education Ministry stated the New Zealand Qualifications Authority provided schools and kura kaupapa with an administration payment.
An NZQA spokesperson said the authority was investigating options for reducing the time it took for test results to be shared with students, after they sat the test.
He stated this would be in place for next year's first assessment round.
What's at stake with the co-requisite tests?
Passing the tests was required for students to achieve an NCEA qualification, although in 2024 and 2025 there are other literacy and numeracy papers students can take to achieve the co-requisite.
This is part of allowing schools time to adjust to the new assessments.
There is no limit on how many times students can sit the tests throughout high school, but there are only two rounds of testing each year, with the next round in September.
Both NZQA and the Secondary Principals' Association pointed out factors that should be considered when examining the pass rates.
"This year’s cohort is much larger than last year’s, with proportionally more Year 11s, many of whom are re-attempting the assessments," a NZQA spokesperson said.
"Students who achieved the standards last year in Year 10 are not attempting them again."'
Anaru added: "We also know that students are using this assessment differently which also needs to be taken into account.
"Some schools are using this as practice assessment for their Year 9's and 10's who may not be ready yet.
"Others are just targeting Year 11 to 13 learners... and putting those through that are ready to be assessed and likely to perform so it's not giving us an accurate picture."
Low pass rates in new online NCEA literacy, numeracy tests worry secondary teachers
RNZ, 8 August 2024
Secondary school principals are calling for a rethink after thousands of teenagers failed new NCEA literacy and numeracy tests.
Secondary school principals are calling for a rethink after thousands of teenagers failed new NCEA literacy and numeracy tests with Māori and Pacific students hardest hit.
Figures from the most recent round of testing in May showed maths was the biggest stumbling block - of the 55,468 who sat the test 30,196 or 54 percent failed.
Half of those who failed maths were Māori or Pacific with failure rates of 77 percent for Pacific students and 71 percent for Māori.
In reading 54 percent of Māori students and 63 percent of Pacific failed, and in writing 55 and 56 percent failed.
Students must pass all three online tests before they are allowed to receive any NCEA qualifications though this year and next year students could use alternative NCEA standards to meet the requirement.
Secondary Principals' Association president Vaughan Couillault said it was time for a rethink.
"I'd say that in general we're concerned about the co-requisites and the fact that it may be creating a larger problem than the one we were trying to solve regarding functional literacy and numeracy," he said.
"It's not helping with the equity gap at all, in fact it's exacerbating it. On the surface of it, you'd say that the literacy and numeracy co-requisites are not helping in terms of students being able to access the qualification."
Couillault said some students might be failing because they did not perform well in online exams, rather than because their literacy or numeracy was poor.
The tests had been introduced at the same time as changes to NCEA level 1 standards which schools were finding more difficult to work with than expected, he said.
Students could meet the literacy and numeracy requirement through specific NCEA standards instead of the tests, but that pathway was only available this year and next, and it was a lot of work, Couillault said.
Some schools asked all their Year 10 students to sit the tests this year, but they might change that approach in future and ensure students did not attempt the exams until teachers judged they were ready, he said.
Teachers questioning if tests fit for purpose - Tinning
Association of Teachers of English president Pip Tinning said the results for Māori and Pacific students were "absolutely horrific".
"It's really concerning that there has been little shift in terms of equitable outcomes for those groups," she said.
Teachers needed more detail from the Qualifications Authority about what students were doing wrong, Tinning said.
Teachers did not want to "teach to the test" but there might be techniques that students could use to improve their results, she said.
Teachers were asking if the tests were fit for purpose and if students had enough support to prepare for the tests, she said.
English teacher Katrina Dyne was completing a PhD on secondary school literacy coordinators - the people who ensured students were ready to sit the reading and writing tests.
She said the results were concerning and put schools under pressure to use their resources to get students up to speed.
"It's not just about passing those tests, it's actually about them having foundational literacy, that's the kind of literacy that these co-requisites are testing, that they have the foundational literacy skills so that they can go out into the world, get jobs, engage with their communities - they're really important," she said.
Dyne said pass rates were a national average so some schools would have worse results and greater challenges in lifting student literacy.
"Some schools will need more resourcing and a lot more support than maybe some others might need," she said.
Students could sit the tests multiple times, but Dyne said the figures indicated students had low pass rates on subsequent attempts.
"For some students, and I totally understand why, if you have had one attempt, two attempts, or more and you haven't been successful at passing these co-requisites I'm not sure how much more motivated you would be to carry on if you've already failed several times," she said.
Dyne said literacy coordinators had been worried about how the tests would affect students and had been working hard to identify those who might not pass the tests.
"Then they're working to lift the literacy levels of these students to get them ready for these tests and then there's another element for these co-reqs in that they have to prepare students to sit the tests as well, so all of the admin, schooling them up in how to log in, how to use the platforms," she said.
More than 55,000 students sat the online tests in May and the highest pass rates were among Year 10 students, most of whom were sitting the tests for the first time, and European students.
Students in other year levels also sat the tests and many of those in Y11-13 would have attempted the tests last year. RNZ previously reported that most students attempting the tests for a second time, failed.
The Qualifications Authority said pass rates by ethnicity for reading were European 68 percent, Asian 56 percent, Māori 46 percent, and Pacific 37 percent.
In writing the pass rates were European 62 percent, Asian 53 percent, Māori 45 percent, and Pacific 44 percent.
In numeracy, European 53 percent, Asian 52 percent, Māori 29 percent, and Pacific 23 percent.
Year 10 pass rates ranged from 67 percent in reading to 57 percent in numeracy.
Year 9 students had better pass rates across all three subjects than those in Y11-13, where pass rates were below 50 percent and in some cases close to 30 percent.
The Qualifications Authority website showed the next round of tests was scheduled for September.
Surging migration stats prompt concern about teacher shortage
Newztalk ZB, 15 Jul 2024
Schools are struggling to find enough specialist teachers for students with English as a second language.
Stats NZ data shows a net figure of almost 22,000 5-to-17 year olds arrived in the year to May this year.
The Education Ministry expects to add a further 371 classrooms by the end of the year, to meet roll growth.
Secondary Principals Association President Vaughan Couillault says those figures can mean a few hundred more teachers are needed.
"There's not enough teachers - full stop. You can end the sentence there, particularly in the secondary space. But at the moment, there's particular pressure on the ESOL area."
Fights now longer, more aggressive: principal
RNZ, 26 May 2024
High schools are witnessing pupils fighting with a type of violence that lasts longer and is more aggressive, the head of a group representing principals says.
The comments were made after Dunedin pupil Enere McLaren-Taana, 16, died after an attack at the city's bus hub on Thursday afternoon.
A 13-year-old boy who is accused of his murder appeared at the Youth Court on Friday.
Police found a knife at the scene and are investigating the circumstances leading up to the stabbing.
In Auckland, there have been a spate of incidents involving knives, and there was one fight where a machete was used.
Secondary Principals Association president Vaughan Couillault said violence between pupils was becoming more acute, leading to serious injuries or worse.
Fights were often among groups and they were "not stopping when the person goes down", he said.
Anecdotally, those engaging in fights were "harder to bring back from the edge - it's harder to de-escalate".
Couillault said there was also an "increasing likelihood that some sort of weaponry is involved".
Family members and friends of students were also getting involved in fights. In the machete incident, the weapon was brandished by a member of the community, not a pupil, he said.
"What we are seeing is the willingness of people who aren't students at school to get involved in what were, 30 years ago, schoolyard conflicts that resolved relatively swiftly and easily. [They are] becoming far more complicated because of the involvement of the wider community."
Umbrella Wellbeing chief executive Dougal Sutherland said the apparent involvement of a weapon was shocking and concerning.
Historically, teenagers had fought with their fists and while this was not to be condoned, the use of a weapon was "really, really troubling", he said.
Violent incidents at bus and train stations involving young people did seem to be on the increase, he said, but there was no obvious reason for this.
However, those types of incidents rarely happened in isolation, he said.
"There's a lot of contextual implications that need to be taken into account, as well as the developmental level of a [young person].
"A lot of factors will have combined to produce this really terrible and tragic outcome."
Overall, offending by adolescents had decreased in the past decade - but a certain group of teenagers were offending more, Dr Sutherland said.
"For a specific subset of adolescents - those with more pervasive antisocial behaviour present since childhood - rates have increased as they are engaging in more offending behaviour.
"These are likely to be the group who show up in the spikes of offending [such as] ram raids, violent behaviour at bus stops and so on."
Deepfake bullying hits New Zealand schools
NZ Herald, 18 June, 2024
As deepfake bullying hits New Zealand schools, the Government is about to turbocharge its fight against online child exploitation material.
The Government is about to turbocharge its fight against online child exploitation material by partnering with a UK watchdog.
It's using artificial intelligence that helps the powerful filter block up to 30,000 harmful sites per day.
But as AI prevents the spread of exploitative imagery, it is also helping to create it.
It's a terrifying new form of online bullying - pornographic deepfakes of students by students, using artificial intelligence.
"Yeah, I'm aware of a few of my colleagues who have had to deal with that sort of issue as recently as in the last fortnight," Secondary Principals' Association president Vaughan Couillault said.
Deepfakes create a sexual image of a person doing or saying things they haven't actually said or done.
The Secondary Principals Association said it's happening in New Zealand.
"There have been cases on both sides of the Tasman that target 50 to 60 young girls in the senior secondary space or indeed some staff so it's certainly increasing in quantum," Couillault said.
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith told Newshub that in most circumstances non-consensual pornographic deepfakes are an offence under the Harmful Digital Communications Act. However, critics say the law only covers instances where police can show offenders' intention to cause a high level of harm.
Makes Sense, an organisation advocating for a safer digital space for children, believes New Zealand's regulation of harmful sexual content online is inadequate.
"We are significantly behind other countries and in a severe issue like children being exploited… It's unacceptable," Makes Sense co-founder and sex therapist Jo Robertson said.
But the Government on Tuesday unveiled one significant improvement.
"I am very pleased to announce that we have struck a new deal with a UK provider to increase how much material is removed from the internet that is child abuse material or child exploitation material," Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden said.
The Government's new deal will see the number of blocked URLs increase from around 700 to up to 30,000 per day. It is adopting the Internet Watch Foundation, something Makes Sense has long been advocating for.
However, it won't stop material like deepfakes from being created.
"Technology is moving extremely fast. Where I'm hoping to focus my efforts is on that criminal activity, the worst of the worst content. There will be more information that I'm sure our Government will need to grapple with as technology moves fast, I'm open to having those conversations," van Velden said.
The Secondary Principals Association said we need to be teaching students about the harm of non-consensual deepfakes.
"Education is always the key so that students, those people, who are doing the bad stuff understand what impact it's having on those who are the victims," Couillault said.
Because the impact can't be deleted.
NCEA results down for fourth year running
The Press, April 30, 2024
New Zealand has failed to reverse a steady decline in NCEA and University Entrance attainment that began after the Covid-19 pandemic.
Less students achieved their respective qualifications in 2023 compared to the previous year, contributing to a four year slump, New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA) data shows.
Overall NCEA level one attainment rates fell 3.2% to 61.7%, level two attainment rates slipped 1.7% to 73.2%, and level three attainment rates decreased 0.5% to 67.7%.
Meanwhile, University Entrance attainment sits at 49.7%, having slipped 0.5% from 2022, and 3.7% from its 2020 recorded peak.
Recorded attainment rates for overall NCEA level one peaked in 2016 at 75.3%. Level two, level three attainment peaked in 2020 at 80.1% and 72.1% respectively.
Secondary Principals' Association of NZ president, Vaughan Couillault, joked each year “every teacher looks at the results for their classes and is never happy”, but their were some explanations.
He said the level one attainment rate was “a bit squishy” as it didn’t factor in the number of students taking the exams, just the number of total students - and many schools were opting out.
An NZQA survey late last year showed 25% of schools were not planning on offering a full assessment NCEA level one programme for year 11 students this year.
In regards to levels two and three, fallen employment had resulted in employers “reaching down” and seeking younger workers to pick up, Couillault said.
“We certainly experienced that at the school I work at and my colleagues as well... kids in August haven’t got their level two yet, but they’ve gone and got a job.”
Concerning the four year decline, teachers had repeatedly been faced with unexpected challenges so “it hasn’t been a level playing field”, he said.
“I know the teaching workforce is pretty damn dedicated and wants to do the absolute best for the students that are sitting in front of them everyday.“
Chris Abercombie, Post Primary Teacher’s Association President, said the results were symptomatic of the pandemic’s continued effects.
“Last year’s Year 13 students, for instance, did practically all their secondary education in extremely disrupted times. While teachers worked hard to get these students through NCEA, the evidence is very clear.
“Students benefit significantly from regular classroom lessons. There is no substitute.”
Abercombie was particularly concerned by last year’s level one attainment but noted year 11s had made the “huge adjustment” to secondary school “during extremely disruptive years”.
A shortage of specialist subject teachers was also “starting to bite”, he said, with a recent PPTA survey revealing nearly 60% of secondary schools have teachers teaching subjects outside their specialist areas.
“All students need – and deserve – to have teachers who know their subject inside out and who can enable students to build a wide and deep knowledge of the subject.
“We urge the government to show its mettle and find effective and lasting solutions for the secondary teacher shortage.”
Within Canterbury, overall NCEA level one attainment dropped 4.1% to 66.1%, level two attainment rates decreased 1.7% to 79% and level three attainment rates declined 2.3%.
Canterbury West Coast Secondary Principals' Association president Joe Eccleton said whenever student achievement decreases schools need to consider future strategies.
“A major focus for all of our schools at the start of each academic year will be a detailed analysis of both, what went well but also what areas need improvement.
“Ultimately, excellent academic achievement provides our students with the opportunities to pursue a life of purpose and as such we need to be constantly considering ways in which we can improve.”
Nationwide school phone ban comes into force today. Will smartwatches provide a loophole?
NZ Herald, 29 Apr, 2024
The Government’s nationwide school phone ban is set to come into effect today as students head back for the beginning of Term 2. But some principals expect “teething problems” and others wonder if devices such as smartwatches or AirPods will provide a loophole to get around the ban.
A ban on cellphones in schools was one of the Government’s key policies heading into last year’s general election to help lift educational achievement, reduce online bullying and remove distractions from the classroom.
The legislation states the ban will impact all students across the country, including primary, intermediate and secondary-aged children.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says he hopes the ban will “turn around falling achievement - students need to focus on their schoolwork during their precious classroom time”.
“That means doing what we can to eliminate unnecessary disturbances and distractions.”
From April 29, students are expected to have their cellphones turned off and away from their person all day, including during breaks and between classes.
‘Improving mental health for kids’ - Education Minister
Education Minister Erica Stanford told Newstalk ZB’s Mike Hosking Breakfast that the cellphone ban in schools is turning into an incredibly positive policy.
”Formby High School said ‘we haven’t had a single case of cyberbullying since the ban was put in place’,” Stanford said.
”I’m starting to think this will be one of the best things we have ever done.”
Stanford said other countries were interested in the plan.
”I was just at a conference in Singapore and all the education minister wanted to talk to me about was, ‘How did you do it and what did you do?’”
When asked about whether the ban would extend to devices such as smartwatches and laptops, Stanford said they would keep an eye on it.
”We haven’t really had any problems with things like kids going to their bag and getting a laptop,” she said.
”It’s a bit of an inconvenience, I don’t think it’s that much of a problem but we’ll keep an eye on it and see how things go.”
Stanford said she is quite happy to be the villain when it comes to the ban, ”if it means improving mental health and academic outcomes for our kids”.
What does a phone ban look like?
Secondary Principals’ Association of New Zealand (Spanz) president Vaughan Couillault says many schools have proactively implemented the rules since the beginning of the school year.
Schools will be able to decide exactly how they enforce the ban, but it could mean requiring students to hand in their phones before school or leave them in their lockers or bags.
Papatoetoe High School had not received a significant amount of negative feedback since implementing the “gentle ban” in February, Couillault said.
At this stage, the use of laptops at break times is exempt from the rules as they are connected to the school network and can be monitored more closely.
Couillault said other “notification-based devices”, such as smartwatches, which had the potential to distract students, “haven’t been explored yet”.
“It all starts to get a bit complicated” when other devices with an ability to connect to the internet were discussed.
Couillault said some schools had also banned AirPods as they were often connected with phone use.
Phone bans had been implemented in a number of schools for some years, he said.
New Zealand Post-Primary Teachers’ Association Te Wehengarua (PPTA) president Chris Abercrombie was “hopeful everyone understands the benefits. It’s a Government policy, not just a school’s”.
“Technology often goes quicker than rules; students will always find loopholes,” Abercrombie said.
He expects some teething problems.
“It’s going to be a big step up for some offices.”
Potential concerns
Unlike some other schools, today will be the “very first time” Huntly College has restricted phone use by implementing a ban.
Principal Rachael Parker said the school was anticipating some pushback from students.
“Our main concern is defiance.”
In terms of the practicality of the rollout at Huntly College, Parker said it felt like taking “quite a few steps back” because phones were often relied on as a teaching tool.
The ban will also mean teachers can’t use their phones in front of students at break times. Parker said the school’s ban follows the principle that “a rule for one is a rule for all”.
With all communication to students going through the school office, Parker said there was potential for miscommunication.
“It increases office workload, delaying communication with sports coaches and employers for after-school jobs.”
School principals on the truth behind truancy
RNZ, 16 April 2024
Bad parenting - or are there a million other reasons that a child might not make it to school?
Ash Maindonald - the principal of Western Heights School, a primary school in West Auckland - says that every principal he speaks to has a litany of war stories they share on the truancy issue.
"It's front and centre, it's top of mind for them," he tells RNZ's First Up host Nathan Rarere on The Detail today.
Maindonald is sceptical about government moves to address truancy, saying one of the causes of it that is not being addressed is "the huge challenges that our explosion of neurodiverse children are posing in class every day.
"Rules, regulations, gimmicky red tape aren't going to make a difference for our neurodiverse children.
"The government needs to take a big look at what they do and what they prioritise and say 'let's forget some of this gimmicky stuff and get some of this real core business stuff sorted' - like a teacher aide in every class, every day, all day'.
"Then you will find that schools, being the self-managing wonders that they are, they will be able to free up other resources to get out into the community and to get out into the homes and to get those children in, because it's people who have a relationship with those families in our community who are going to be able to have the most success interacting with them."
Community involvement is a common theme among the three principals we talked to for today's episode, along with the need for more resources to tackle attendance and truancy problems, rather than 'gimmicks' like traffic lights.
The government announced last week an "attendance action plan" to address what it calls a "truancy crisis".
The government has a target of having 80 percent of students at school more than 90 per cent of the term by 2030. The most recent statistics (from Term 4 last year) show only 53.6 percent of students reached that target.
In the first phase, from Term 2 (on 29 April), there will be a public communications campaign, updated public health guidance on attending school and schools will be made to publish attendance data weekly instead of every term.
Further proposals still have to be approved by Cabinet - they include a traffic light system to monitor attendance and daily reporting of attendance data by Term 1 next year.
The president of the Secondary Principals' Association is not too worried about the extra reporting requirements.
Vaughan Couillault, who is also the principal of Papatoetoe High School in South Auckland, says it's just a matter of uploading a digital file and exporting it.
But he says the change has to be done right.
"If they're looking to gather and publish information that is systemic - that is about weekly attendance so that everyone can get in behind the national drive to getting everyone back to school... then the data is useful. If there's going to be a set of league tables... that is unlikely to be helpful.''
Couillault thinks daily reporting won't provide the clarity the government is looking for, as there can be a "lag with comms from families".
He believes the proposed traffic light system could work if it's targeted at a student, but is worried about targeting it at schools.
"The heart of it is when schools are unable to intervene any further because the issues around attendance are more societal and systemic, we need to have not only capacity but capability to access external agencies to do the lifting to get those people back to school.
"We know that where it has worked - it's a community response using community people to resolve those community issues.
"They have to know the person who's coming to talk to them - attendance improves when the family are engaged and understand the value of regular daily attendance."
The Detail also speaks to Sommerville Special School principal Belinda Johnston, who we spoke to earlier this year for another episode.
She says reasons for her students not attending could be because they end up in hospital due to a sickness, as many of them are immunocompromised.
She says some families don't want to bring the student to school because those events might have been traumatic and stressful.
"For some families... where it's not complex - I think an attendance officer can be just like a little gentle reminder. It's not that they never work, but the ones that are hardest to get back to school, it's less likely to work with them because there's usually really good reasons happening in the background that need some proper support.
"Our families are so stressed and so traumatised that they don't want a stranger banging on their door anyway. What they need is someone to work alongside them and help them through their challenges and work out a way to come back to school."
She's calling for funding for specialist staff that can be employed directly by the school.
"None of that [traffic light or data publishing] is going to help attendance. All it does is tell you about it, but we already know about it, we don't need to know about it anymore we've already got the facts - what we need is some help to change it."
Principal says free school lunches would help attendance after Govt reveals absenteeism action plan
NewsHub, 9 April, 2024
The Government has revealed its plan to turn around what it's calling the attendance crisis.
Schools will be required to publish attendance data daily and a traffic light system is being developed to monitor students' attendance records.
A red light could mean fines for parents or other interventions if there are more complex reasons students are missing school.
But an educational leader says school lunches are part of the attendance solution.
On Tuesday the Prime Minister's focus was to eradicate abysmal attendance. Only 46 percent of school pupils attended classes regularly in term three last year.
"We've got a clear goal, we want 80 percent of kids at school 90 percent of the time by 2030," Christopher Luxon said.
The first step to managing the problem is to measure it. Attendance data will soon be published weekly then starting next year daily reporting, COVID-style.
"We believe that educational attendance is now a crisis with similar long-term effects for New Zealand," said Associate Minister of Education David Seymour.
"Weekly reporting is fine but we don't necessarily have all the answers to why someone was away within the 24-hour timeframe. It normally takes us two or three days to get that data accurately recorded so for me day by day might be a little bit more granular," said Vaughan Couillault, who's the Papatoetoe High School principal and president of the Secondary Principals' Association.
The COVID-19 crisis approach doesn't stop at the data. The longer-term plan is to bring back a traffic light system.
But the red light response will look different to students in different situations.
"Some parents aren't sending their kids to school because they have no money and they're sending their kids out to work. Others are not sending their kids to school because they do have enough money but they wanted to get a cheaper airfare to Fiji in the last week of term," Seymour said.
"Now obviously in those two cases there's going to be a different approach from the Government."
While Seymour wants to keep the COVID-19 era's tools, he wants to drop the era's attitude to staying home when you're sick.
"We've seen the focus on education fall down the totem pole of national priorities."
Couillault said school lunches are part of the attendance solution.
"It's not the only thing - so you're not going to go from 55 percent regularly attending to 80 percent regularly attending overnight, but it is certainly a contributing factor when you don't have to worry about nutritional poverty," he said.
The Education Ministry's latest evidence shows for underserved students there was a 1.6 percent improvement in attendance in schools with lunches.
That equated to an additional three days a year - on average - of school.
Seymour has previously said he wants to halve funding, but said on Tuesday that didn't mean carving back access to lunches.
"There's a very strong chance that it will be exactly the same kids but there's also a strong chance that once you come down to surplus and wastage you find actually we can do more for kids in greater need if we have a slightly different set of kids," he said.
Because cuts to a programme that drives attendance seem counterintuitive.
School stand-downs and suspensions rise as educators raise concerns about behaviour
NZ Herald, 2 April 2024
More school students are being stood down and suspended from New Zealand schools, as educators raise concerns about behaviour.
Vaughan Couillault, president of the Secondary Principals’ Association of New Zealand and the principal at Papatoetoe High School in Auckland, believes the figures are down to worsening student behaviour, with Covid measures having played a role.
Ministry of Education data shows in 2023 there were 22,080 stand-downs, up from 18,677 in 2022, and 16,487 in 2019 before Covid-19 pandemic restrictions closed schools for periods of time.
Last year, there were 3124 suspensions, up from 2483 the year prior and 2987 pre-pandemic.
There were 1241 exclusions in 2023, up from 852 in 2022 and 1052 in 2019.
An exclusion is the formal removal of a student under the age of 16 from school, and there is a legal requirement that they are enrolled in education. An expulsion is the formal removal of a student over 16, and the student is not required to enrol elsewhere but may be supported to do so. In 2023, 104 students were expelled, higher than 98 in 2022 but lower than 143 in 2019.
”Schools don’t really want to do stand-downs and suspensions - they are the highest-order discipline interventions you can engage in. It really is linked to the behaviour students are presenting with,” Couillault said.
At the secondary school level, students who were significantly disrupted through Covid when they were in intermediate school, or about to enter it, seem to be lacking some behaviours, as they did not have the opportunity to learn positive social behaviours as they moved into adolescence, he said.
”The behaviours that we’re seeing in the secondary space, particularly Year 9 and 10 students in the past couple of years, has increased in quantum and increased in its acuteness.”
Couillault believes societally, there needs to be a look at what community support is available for students behaving at that level, as they often have a raft of issues that may stem from mental health concerns, poverty or neglect.
The data follows research from the Education Review Office that found disruptive behaviour in New Zealand classrooms is worse than in other countries and a rapidly growing problem.
A quarter of principals told the ERO they see students harm others and damage or take property at least every day. Three-quarters of teachers reported disruptive behaviour impacting students’ progress.
School leaders unite to defend free lunches
RNZ, 12 March 2024
A dozen school and early childhood sector groups have united to ask Prime Minister Christopher Luxon to retain funding for the free school lunch scheme, Ka Ora Ka Ako.
In a letter to Luxon published on Tuesday afternoon, the organisations said the programme was critical.
The letter's signatories covered Catholic, area, intermediate and Montessori schools, primary, secondary and Māori principals, both teacher unions, kindergartens and one of the main early childhood education associations.
"As leaders of the education sector, we jointly urge you to continue the government's current level of investment in Ka ora Ka Ako, the school lunches programme," they said.
"One in five children in our country live with food poverty. Nutritious food is essential for learning, which is why the school lunch programme was created. It currently offers lunches to 230,000 students in about 1,000 of the least advantaged schools, providing a major safety net against food poverty and poor nutrition."
The letter said research from the PISA (Program for International Student Achievement) study showed students who missed meals due to lack of money were two to four years behind in their learning compared to those who never missed meals.
"Of concern is that the most recent PISA results found 14 percent of New Zealand students did not eat at least once a week because of lack of money, compared to 8 percent of students on average across the OECD," it said.
"Your government is committed to improving student achievement and supporting Kiwi families who are facing significant cost of living pressures. The most recent research evaluating the Ka Ora Ka Ako programme reinforces the views of school principals that it has led to students being more focussed on their learning, fewer working to support their families, fewer behavioural problems, improved social bonding and reduced food poverty stigma through all students sharing meals together."
The letter was signed by leaders of the Educational Institute, Secondary Principals Association, Post Primary Teachers' Association, Association of Intermediate and Middle Schools, Principals Federation, School Trustees Association, Te Akatea (Māori Principals Association), Area Schools Association, New Zealand Catholic Education Office, Te Rito Maioha Early Childhood New Zealand, Montessori Aotearoa New Zealand, and the New Zealand Kindergartens Network.
The letter followed recent comments from Associate Education Minister David Seymour indicating funding for the scheme could be reduced.
Seymour said there was no hard evidence the programme improves children's achievement and attendance and he was considering cutting its funding by up to half.
The scheme introduced by the Labour government in 2019 feeds more than 220,000 students at a cost of about $325 million a year.
Last year the previous government approved funding for the programme only until the end of this year after Treasury advised that evaluations of Ka Ora Ka Ako showed health benefits, but little educational benefit.
"Evaluations of Ka Ora, Ka Ako to date have found strong outcomes for improving nutrient intake, particularly for those 7.3 percent of ākonga with least access to sufficient food at home. The programme generally contributes to happier and healthier ākonga overall," Treasury's advice said.
"However, the evaluations have found no impact on attendance, and ākonga Māori, who make up around 48 percent of students receiving the programme, have not benefited on most metrics, such as school functioning (e.g., paying attention in class), health, and mental wellbeing (with mental wellbeing worse off for those in the programme)," it said.
Health Coalition Aotearoa has defended the scheme, noting that assessment of the programme happened in 2021 when student attendance reached all-time lows due to high levels of covid and other illnesses in the community.