Crackdown on school truancy; funding cut for te reo Māori

Thursday, 26 September 2024

The Government has announced a new scheme to tackle absenteeism at schools.

The Star system will catch truant students and put them back in school.

Each school will have their own star plan, with the scheme set to be implemented by 2026.

The Government has cut funding to help teach te reo, as it says that money will be better spent on maths resources.

Education Minister Erica Stanford announced the funding “reprioritisation” on Thursday, as associate minister David Seymour announced his own crackdown on truancy.

Seymour called it the “Star system”. That stood for “Stepped Attendance Response”, which would catch truant students and put them back in school, starting in 2026.

And he wasn’t just concerned with absent students. Seymour has also called on schools to stop using “teacher only days”.

“Schools will have to play their part in setting a good example as well. This means not taking teacher-only days during term time,” he said.

Each school would have its own Star plan, with more intensive responses the longer the child was absent.

It would start with a message to the parents, and could lead to the Ministry of Education being called in to fine the parents.

“Any student who reaches a clearly defined threshold of days absent will trigger an appropriate and proportionate response from their school and the Ministry,” Seymour said.

He said interventions could include the school working on plans to help parents, and the school’s leadership meeting with parents and the student to identify barriers to attendance and develop plans to address this.

The Ministry of Education would work with schools, the Attendance Service, non-government agencies and other government agencies to streamline the new system

Seymour said the issue of absenteeism in schools is serious, with New Zealand’s regular attendance rate only 47.1% in 2023.

“If this issue isn’t addressed there will be an 80-year long shadow of people who missed out on education when they were young, are less able to work, less able to participate in society, more likely to be on benefits. That’s how serious this is.

“The basic premise of the Star is that no child is left behind. Every student, parent, teacher and school has a role to play,” he said.

Seymour added he has directed the Ministry to take a more active role in the prosecution process.

Cuts to te reo to fund maths books

Meanwhile, Stanford confirmed the Government had pulled funding out of Te Ahu o te Reo Māori, a programme to teach te reo to teachers.

“Since 2019, $100 million has funded this initiative which isn’t accredited and more than double the cost of similar courses available. An evaluation of the programme found no evidence it directly impacted progress,” she said.

The money would instead be used to fund $30 million worth of workbooks and teacher training for maths.