Alwyn Poole: Why this data publish by the NZ Herald is SO IMPORTANT

For many years in NZ schools have fudged their data. There used to be something called participation data that was, frankly, gamed to the point of being fraudulent.

The previous National government hit that on the head.

In February schools publish their “roll” data which does not account for all of the students who have left school prior to the relevant cohort. Some schools with apparent reputations will have lost 30% or more of their students before they turn 17. It is a much higher proportion for Maori and Pasifika students in those schools.