A Summary of Cameron Bagrie’s Business Desk Piece on Education (all quotes below)
– Do we have equality of opportunity in schooling? We’d like to think so. I’ve heard many politicians talk about it. We do not have it.
– Education is one of my bugbears that I consider an essential part of the economic formula for addressing social challenges and increasing living standards.
– In the race of life and schooling [some] have a massive head-start courtesy of wealth, parents’ education and income, the school zone grown up in, family support, whether parents own their own home or rent, are still married, haven’t been in prison, or subject to physical harm to name a few.
– The operational funding for primary and secondary schools, including teachers’ salary, was around $7.9 billion in 2024. It works out to be around $9,300 per student. This excludes private schools.
– Teacher’s remuneration is the biggest cheque by a long shot coming in around $5.4 billion in 2024. The government directly funds that but try running a budget with a fixed wage cost representing 70 percent of your operation. You do not have many levers left to play with if you have an unexpected expense or underlying pressures.
– To help level the playing field, schools have access to Equity Funding.
– The EQI is a mechanism that tries to understand the relationship between social and economic factors and student achievement. The EQI determines how much equity funding a school receives in addition to their regular funding. The higher the EQI, the more funding the school receives per student. It starts at zero (EQI 344) but goes up to around $1,100 per student (EQI 569).
– Attend a 350 EQI school and the data tells us more than 80 per cent will get NCEA level 3 and retention in school to age 17 is more than 90 percent. Sixty percent will get a bachelor’s degree or level 7 qualification.
– Attend a high EQI school (>500) and the average for NCEA level 3 achievement is less than 40 per cent though there are outliers. The (average) percentage progressing to getting a degree is less than 10 percent. The same divergences apply with attendance.
– Equity Index funding in 2024 was less than $250 million in total against direct spending of $7.9 billion. Compare that to $2.5 billion of departmental output expenditure and several hundred million on school lunches.
– EQI funding is around 3 per cent of primary and secondary schools operational and teachers pay funding, yet it is one of the mechanisms we are trying to level the playing field. Three percent! I almost fell off my chair.
However, as a comparator, consider what as parents you might pay in donations if your child goes to a low EQI school. Odds are it’ll be more than $1,100.
I recently visited a school with very low attendance and lots of gang related students. The principal showed me the Budget. EQI funding was 5 per cent of total funding. Some things that chewed up their EQI contribution … Loaner uniforms. Stationery. Sport transport and payment of fees (because parents can’t). Licenses. Vandalism. Bus hire for trips and visits. This is before a cent is directed at core teaching.
– We spend more on the winter energy payment than we spend on EQI funding.
The EQI funding rate rises by 1.5 per cent between 2025 and 2026. Inflation is 3 per cent. The effective funding has been cut.
The EQI contribution needs to be lifted a long way if we are serious about equality of opportunity. $1,100 [at the MOST] is simply not enough.
Alwyn Poole, a well-known figure in the New Zealand education system, he founded and was the head of Mt Hobson Middle School in Auckland for 18 years. This article was published HERE
– The operational funding for primary and secondary schools, including teachers’ salary, was around $7.9 billion in 2024. It works out to be around $9,300 per student. This excludes private schools.
– Teacher’s remuneration is the biggest cheque by a long shot coming in around $5.4 billion in 2024. The government directly funds that but try running a budget with a fixed wage cost representing 70 percent of your operation. You do not have many levers left to play with if you have an unexpected expense or underlying pressures.
– To help level the playing field, schools have access to Equity Funding.
– The EQI is a mechanism that tries to understand the relationship between social and economic factors and student achievement. The EQI determines how much equity funding a school receives in addition to their regular funding. The higher the EQI, the more funding the school receives per student. It starts at zero (EQI 344) but goes up to around $1,100 per student (EQI 569).
– Attend a 350 EQI school and the data tells us more than 80 per cent will get NCEA level 3 and retention in school to age 17 is more than 90 percent. Sixty percent will get a bachelor’s degree or level 7 qualification.
– Attend a high EQI school (>500) and the average for NCEA level 3 achievement is less than 40 per cent though there are outliers. The (average) percentage progressing to getting a degree is less than 10 percent. The same divergences apply with attendance.
– Equity Index funding in 2024 was less than $250 million in total against direct spending of $7.9 billion. Compare that to $2.5 billion of departmental output expenditure and several hundred million on school lunches.
– EQI funding is around 3 per cent of primary and secondary schools operational and teachers pay funding, yet it is one of the mechanisms we are trying to level the playing field. Three percent! I almost fell off my chair.
However, as a comparator, consider what as parents you might pay in donations if your child goes to a low EQI school. Odds are it’ll be more than $1,100.
I recently visited a school with very low attendance and lots of gang related students. The principal showed me the Budget. EQI funding was 5 per cent of total funding. Some things that chewed up their EQI contribution … Loaner uniforms. Stationery. Sport transport and payment of fees (because parents can’t). Licenses. Vandalism. Bus hire for trips and visits. This is before a cent is directed at core teaching.
– We spend more on the winter energy payment than we spend on EQI funding.
The EQI funding rate rises by 1.5 per cent between 2025 and 2026. Inflation is 3 per cent. The effective funding has been cut.
The EQI contribution needs to be lifted a long way if we are serious about equality of opportunity. $1,100 [at the MOST] is simply not enough.
Alwyn Poole, a well-known figure in the New Zealand education system, he founded and was the head of Mt Hobson Middle School in Auckland for 18 years. This article was published HERE
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