Govt could do better at rounding up truants – and at ensuring all students have something to show for their schooling
The country’s hard-working ministers – and their not-so-hard-working colleagues – perhaps are out on the campaign trail, doing their bit to secure the government’s re-election. That would explain the absence of new announcements, pronouncements or pontifications when Point of Order checked the government’s official website for news early this morning.
What to do?
Because of some data published by TheFacts on educational issues, we checked back on recent press statements from our Education Ministers to refresh our memories.
Some were joint press statements to which the PM contributed (on occasions when the news was unlikely to blight his image).
While we were doing this, one new announcement was posted on the government’s website and – would you believe? – it was related to schools and it was released in the name of Chris Hipkins –
Some were joint press statements to which the PM contributed (on occasions when the news was unlikely to blight his image).
While we were doing this, one new announcement was posted on the government’s website and – would you believe? – it was related to schools and it was released in the name of Chris Hipkins –
Latest from the Beehive
Release
5 SEPTEMBER 2023
The Wainuiomata High School redevelopment is making great progress, with two more classroom blocks set to be complete by the end of the month, Prime Minister Chris Hipkins announced today.
Here are some of the other recent education announcements –
25 AUGUST 2023
The Chris Hipkins Government has made major progress in upgrading and building classrooms and other school property across the country.
24 AUGUST 2023
A programme that helps thousands of kiwi children and young people, their parents and teachers has hit a major milestone, with 100 million free and healthy school lunches delivered.
23 AUGUST 2023
A new fund will help remove barriers and improve opportunities for the most underserved tertiary students in New Zealand, Education Minister Jan Tinetti has announced today.
23 AUGUST 2023
A multi-million investment package in teacher supply announced in September last year has already exceeded its goal of 1,000 new teachers.
22 AUGUST 2023
Rapid action taken by the Government to improve attendance is working, Minister of Education Jan Tinetti said today.
21 AUGUST 2023
The Government is taking action to make sure every child leaves school with a bright future and equipped with a foundational knowledge in maths, reading and writing by making their teaching requirements compulsory and consistent.
This took us back far enough to include Education Minister Jan Tinetti’s delight that “rapid action taken by the Government to improve attendance is working”.
It so happened our visit to TheFacts website introduced us to data on
- school attendance (hot off the press, posted today); and
- educational accomplishments:
First up …
Click image to view
KEY NOTES
- The most commonly used attendance metric by politicians, media, and the Ministry of Education is the 90% rule which measures what % of children currently attend 90% of school days (9 days each fortnight).
- This attendance data from the Ministry of Education started in 2011.
- From 2011 to 2018, only term 2 data was recorded, which is why it’s the only comparison we have a) over 10+ years and b) between governments.
- From 2019, attendance data for all 4 terms was recorded. Attendance varies greatly between terms, which is why it’s best to plot/analyse each term separately, e.g. term 2 typically has the lowest attendance.
- It normally takes ~2.5 months for this data to be released. Term 2 data has a bit more information and is scheduled for release 4.5 months later on Nov 9.
- Term 1 2023 saw an increase from 46% to 60%, but
- This is significantly lower than the pre-Covid term 1 attendance figure of 73%
- Overall, school attendance has been steadily dropping since 2015 and
- Attendance dropped significantly in 2022 for all terms
- Are these declining attendance rates a concern? If so, how much? If not, why not?
- How do we apportion the cause of these declining metrics between our:
1 Covid response2 Education policies/governance3 Teacher-only days/strikes4 School closure days, e.g. bad weather5 Cost of living pressures6Other social factors?
3 Can we determine from this data that National-led Governments outperform Labour-led Governments on educational attendance?4 Why does it take 2.5 months for the term 1/3/4 data to be released, and 4.5 months for term 2? Should it be faster?5 TheFacts website says all publicly available years and terms have been published.
We have asked the Ministry of Education why it takes 4.5 months for the term 2 data to be released (due Nov 9).
TheFacts explains that the data includes primary and secondary schools.
Not all schools submit attendance reports each week because doing so is optional.
Attendance reports are anonymous, which means the schools which are performing best and those that are performing worst can’t be identified.
The Ministry of Education has advised TheFacts:
- A student is counted as present on-site if they are on-site at any time during a day.
- Similarly, a student is counted as off-site (learning at home) if they are recorded as learning at home at any time during a day.
- If a student attends school for part of the day and learns from home the rest of the day, that student is counted in each category: once for attending on-site and once for learning at home. [Note from theFacts: this will inflate attendance levels slightly]
- Students are not included as learning at home if:they are unwell
* they are absent due to parent concerns about the risk of contracting COVID-19, or* the absence is unexplained
- There are many variables that impact school attendance, including:
* Covid response/lockdowns* Education policies/governance* Teacher-only days/strikes* School closure days, e.g. bad weather* Cost of living pressures* Other social factors
Hmm. The government – clearly – could do better in the truancy department.
Another set of data we would like to see winkled out of the authorities would tell us about the prosecution of delinquent parents.
The numbers (we suspect) will be negligible.
What about student achievements?
Click image to view
TheFacts reports:
KEY INSIGHTS
From the 2022 School Leavers data recently released:
* 15% left without any NCEA qualification (up 50% since 2017’s 10% figure)
* 25% left without getting NCEA Level 2 (not shown in graph above)
* 48% (~1/2) left without getting NCEA Level 3 or UE (not shown in graph above)
* 21.5% left before turning 17-years-old (up 36% since 2017’s 15.8% figure)
* 33% more 16-year-olds left school
* 63% more 15-year-olds left school
(data for 14-year-olds wasn’t provided)
KEY QUESTIONS
1 Are these declining retention and qualification metrics a concern? If so, how much? If not, why not?
2 How do we apportion the cause of these declining metrics between our:
1 Covid response
2 Education policies/governance
3 Teacher-only days/strikes
4 Cost of living pressures
5 Other social factors?
3 Can we determine from this data that National-led Governments outperform Labour-led Governments on education matters?
TheFacts team explains that all publicly available years have been published. It has asked the Ministry of Education how to source data before 2012.
Multiple NCEA achievement levels could have been graphed.
- We choose to show the % of Kiwi kids who are leaving school without any NCEA qualification at all, as we felt that was the most important insight.
- In the insights section above, however, we have also showed the % not achieving NCEA Level 2 (widely considered to be the bare minimum needed when leaving school), and also the % not achieving NCEA Level 3 or UE (University Entrance).
We compared 2022 results to the 2017 year when National was last in power.
Even though the 2017 election took place on the 23rd of September with a couple of months in the school year left to run, we felt it was fair to consider the 2017 education results as Nationals. The announcement of a Labour-NZ First coalition Government came on the 19th of October, almost a month after the election.
More information about methodology and what-have-you can be found on their website.
Point of Order is a blog focused on politics and the economy run by veteran newspaper reporters Bob Edlin and Ian Templeton
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