Orewa Primary School

Te Ara Huarau | School Profile Report

Background

This Profile Report was written within 6 months of the Education Review Office and Orewa Primary School working in Te Ara Huarau, an improvement evaluation approach used in most English Medium State and State Integrated Schools. For more information about Te Ara Huarau see ERO’s website. www.ero.govt.nz

Context 

Orewa School caters for children in years 1 to 6 and is on the Hibiscus Coast in Auckland. The vision and valued outcomes defined by the school for all children are focused on empowering students to achieve personal excellence in a learning culture that values all. The school motto, "where everybody is somebody" is well understood by children and the school community.

Orewa Primary School’s strategic priorities for improving outcomes for learners are:

• Relationships (Whanaungatanga). With the belief that relationships are at the heart of a community, we will provide shared experiences and work together to give people a sense of connectedness and belonging.

• Curriculum (Marau Mātauranga). The school will design and deliver a future focused and inclusive curriculum that identifies, accelerates, and extends the learning capacity of all learners/ākonga.

• Teaching, Learning, Assessment and Pedagogy (Ako). The school will provide teaching and learning that is reciprocal where knowledge and understandings grow out of shared learning experiences and teacher practice is both deliberate and reflective, informed by the latest research.

• Leadership (Te Kaiarahi). The school will assure quality teaching and learning, providing opportunities for those aspiring to become leaders.

• Well-being (Hauora). The school will ensure every learner/ākonga has a safe, healthy, and supportive learning environment, where they are accepted and respected, and their identity, language, and culture, and those of their family and whānau are valued.

You can find a copy of the school’s strategic and annual plan on Orewa Primary School’s website.

ERO and the school are working together to evaluate how the use of evidence-based assessment, inquiry and knowledge building approaches can further improve teaching, learning and assessment practices and encourage students/ākonga to be active participants in their learning. 

The rationale for selecting this evaluation is to:

• ensure all teachers have a shared understanding of best practice for accelerating all learners

• encourage ākonga to be more actively engaged in their learning and from this gain confidence in what they are expected to learn and what they need to do to improve.

The school expects to see equitable and excellent outcomes for all ākonga and continued development of strategic teaching and learning programmes.

Strengths

The school can draw from the following strengths to support its goal to evaluate how the use of evidence-based assessment, inquiry and knowledge building approaches can further improve teaching, learning and assessment practices and encourage students/ākonga to be active participants in their learning. 

• current professional capability and collective capacity to use assessment, inquiry and knowledge building for continual improvement

• current processes to refine targets and strengthen monitoring

• ability to adapt to and apply the assessment expectations of the revised curriculum as it is developed

• teacher collaboration and developed understanding of moderation to support the learning and achievement of all learners.

Where to next?

Moving forward, the school will prioritise:

• adapting assessment practices to meet the refreshed curriculum and the Better Start Literacy Approach - Te Ara Reo Matatini

• a biannual review of evidence-based moderation and assessment.

ERO’s role will be to support the school in its evaluation for improvement cycle to improve outcomes for all learners. ERO will support the school in reporting their progress to the community. The next public report on ERO’s website will be a Te Ara Huarau | School Evaluation Report and is due within three years.

Shelley Booysen
Director of Schools

2 June 2023 

About the School

The Education Counts website provides further information about the school’s student population, student engagement and student achievement.  educationcounts.govt.nz/home