No more teacher-only days during term time, David Seymour says

Thursday, 26 September 2024

Schools will no longer be able to hold teacher-only days during term time and parents of students absent for 15 days could be prosecuted, the Government has announced.

Associate Education Minister David Seymour announced the new truancy crackdown on Thursday, at the same time Education Minister Erica Stanford said the Government would take funding to help teach te reo and “reprioritise” it.

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

If a student was absent for five days, the school would contact their parents to find out why and “set expectations”. After 10 days, senior leadership would be involved, and after 15 days parents could be prosecuted.

Seymour called on schools to stop using “teacher only days” during term time to set a good example for their students.

Christchurch’s Avonside Girls’ High School principal Catherine Law said schools already kept a close eye on absenteeism and were working “incredibly hard” to address it.

Parents were automatically texted twice a day with an update on whether their child was in class. When students skipped a day, the school immediately talked to parents, and involved senior staff if the issue progressed, she said.

“He (Seymour) needs to get into schools and find out what’s happening because a lot of schools are targeting attendance and doing a good job at it.”

The school could escalate an absenteeism case to the ministry, but found better success with their whanaū engagement officer who talked to families, checked in on students, and inspired them to attend school.

The ministry had funded $30,000 toward the officer this year, and the school hoped the funding would continue, Law said.

“Each school’s attendance is different, it’s not a one size fits all. It needs to be specific to the community and it's about building trust with your parents.

“I really want to reiterate and emphasise how important it is for the ministry to do what the ministry is doing in Canterbury - trust schools. Give them their funding and trust them.”

Rangiora Borough School principal Shane Buckner* was critical of Seymour’s “big stick approach”.

Being heavy handed with parents would not solve truancy but impact parent/ school relationships, he said.

“Education can be impacted by family health and exceptional social circumstances, and we already work hard with whanau to remove as many barriers to learning as possible.

“The minister’s stance on teacher-only days is disingenuous, there will be the same number of learning days - we will add an additional day onto the school holidays to allow teachers the time to prepare for teaching.“

Christchurch’s Te Kōmanawa Rowley School principal Graeme Norman said schools needed solutions that considered local community issues, not a heavy-handed national approach.

The school had self-funded a whanau engagement officer from Tuahiwi Marae to liaise with Māori and Pasifika families.

“We had 40% attendance, and now we are up to 87% because we know what our community needs, so we offer free uniforms and lunches in school. I door knock if a student doesn’t come to school and we pick kids up in the school van.”

NZ Educational Institute president Mark Potter in a statement said creating new regulations for schools was ironic for a minister who wanted to deregulate everything in early childhood education.

“Punishing parents is not what will work. You’ve got to get alongside them and understand the issues as to why a child isn’t attending, and then mitigate against the barriers they’ve got.”

Post Primary Teachers’ Association president Chris Abercrombie said banning teacher-only days during term time was a “misnomer” as schools legally needed to make up the lost teaching time elsewhere.

Many teacher-only days were used for parent-teacher interviews or course selection and some teacher-only days had been government enforced this year to keep up with NCEA and other changes, he said.

Seymour refused to answer if issues truancy often stemmed from, like poverty and family violence, would be addressed by the system.

“Every student, parent, school and community has a role in addressing the issue of attendance. The worst thing the Government can do for the most socio-economic deprived students is nothing at all.

“This will require the Ministry of Education to be much more active in its participation. For example it could convene local roundtables of schools, government agencies and attendance officers.”

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.”

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, $100m 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 $30m million worth of workbooks and teacher training for maths.

*CORRECTION: The original article (published on online on Friday September 27) mistakenly said Shane Buckner was principal of Wairakei School in Christchurch. Shane Buckner has been principal of Rangiora Borough School since 2021.