Why parents are being warned to expect bad school reports
Saturday, 6 June 2026
Schools have warned parents their child’s academic performance might “shift or drop”, as they adjust to a “refreshed” curriculum.
With standards now much higher for each year group, many students new to the refreshed curriculum were not meeting the criteria.
A secondary teacher who spoke with The Post on condition of anonymity said she had fielded questions from worried parents and students about a perceived drop in her students’ performance.
“They see they've gone from performing above the level all through primary, intermediate and year 9, to now being below the level. It’s really hard on them.”
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Her school has sent newsletters to parents, letting them know that new assessment measures would make their performance look a little different on paper.
The Post has seen a number of school newsletters from the past few months, telling parents to expect changes.
“The refreshed curriculums introduce new learning outcomes that don’t always align directly with the previous curriculum,” read a typical example.
“As a result, it may appear that your child’s progress has shifted or dropped, when in fact it’s the curriculum framework that has changed.”
What has happened?
New Zealand is in the middle of a curriculum change that the Government says will place a greater emphasis on literacy and numeracy, and result in more consistent learning outcomes across the country.
The roll-out is happening in stages: from this year, the new English and maths curriculum, which some schools began teaching last year, is compulsory for years 1 to 10.
Next year will see a new science and social science curriculum, and remaining subjects will be introduced in 2029.
Teachers will assess students achievement with progress descriptors: these are emerging, developing, consolidating, proficient and exceeding.
Aotearoa Educators Collective spokesperson Liam Rutherford explained the impact on student progress, using the example of an 11-year-old learner.
Previously, a teacher would have assessed this 11-year-old to see where they sat, and then “given them the next step”.
“[Now], they've created a body of knowledge that 11-year-olds need to know, and regardless of the capability of the kid, you teach them that.”
For children who have “found school tough,” this meant they would be taught content well above their capabilities, Rutherford said.
But there was also a flipside.
“If you've got a really capable kid, they're going to be given content that they will pick up in seconds… and rather than giving them the next year’s content, you keep them within that content but they just get recorded as exceeding.”
Rutherford said this was causing problems in classrooms with multi-year levels. This included smaller schools, and intermediates, where years 7 and 8 typically shared a classroom.
“Under this new model teachers need to teach a separate year 7 group and a separate year 8 group because that's how they're assessed.”
Levelling up
The secondary school teacher called it a “levelling up”, with standards now much higher for each year group.
“On paper it seems good: to help our students be more academic,” she said.
But for the moment, many students new to the refreshed curriculum were not meeting the criteria.
“Most of my year 10 class are getting below the level.”
Despite explaining to her students why their grades were suddenly different, many were worried about their academic performance.
The school was a low equity index (formerly high decile), and her students consistently outperformed national performance.
“But I'm certainly not finding that there are many at the top end of the marking schedule.”
It was her learning support students who were of most concern, she said.
“They just don't have the ability to meet the standard.”
After one assessment, where most of her students got “the very bottom grade”, she didn’t have the heart to give them their marks: it was too demoralising, she said.
“[A] downside is that it's going to distinguish quite early on students who are academic and students who are not meeting the grade… which will create a division.”
Hobsonville Point Primary School principal Daniel Birch had front-footed the shift with school newsletters, a parent “cheat sheet” explaining the changes and a planned parent evening.
“We're having to explain that the levels they thought their kids were at based on last year's information has changed due to the changing goalposts.”
Birch noticed a real shift after the maths curriculum was introduced last October.
“Things that kids used to know in year 7, they’re now being asked to know in year 4.”
The example he gave was exponents.
“There’s lots of filling that needs to be done for (year 4) kids to understand what exponents are and how they work.”
And not just students, Birch pointed out.
“Teachers who have never taught exponents before at year 4 now have to work out how they are going to teach it.”
Birch expected it would take a few years for students who meet the current curriculum standards to be regarded as meeting the equivalent standards in the new curriculum.
“There’s a lot of back-filling to do.”
However, against these new requirements, Birch was determined to maintain focus on “the whole child”, adding extra information for parents.
“We will report because we're required to, but we're going to be really clear with our parent community that this report is an academic snapshot.”
That snapshot did not capture the learning that happens at school camp, or the growth that comes with problem-solving or collaborating, Birch said.
“We will be celebrating the children in all their glory, rather than focusing solely on reading, writing, and maths.”
Antony Harvey, the acting general manager of the Ministry of Education’s Te Poutāhū, curriculum centre, said the ministry had released guidance on the assessments and how to talk about them with whānau.
A new curriculum, with “updated teaching approaches, content, and assessment,” would mean reporting that might look different from previous years, Harvey said.
“Expectations have changed at each year level, so a child’s progress or achievement might not line up with what families have seen before.”
The progress descriptors were a way to more clearly show how students were tracking and the aim was for students to reach “proficient” or above by the end of the year, he said.