St John the Evangelist Catholic School

Te Ara Huarau | School Profile Report 

Background

This Profile Report was written within 11 months of the Education Review Office and St John the Evangelist Catholic 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 

St John the Evangelist Catholic School is a state integrated school for girls from Years 1 to 8 and boys from Years 1 to 6. The school shares a large site in Otara, with the St John the Evangelist Parish, Te Whaiora Marae, Kohanga Reo, and the St John the Evangelist Preschool. The current principal was appointed in 2020 The school has recently undergone a full rebuild. The school vision is ‘Live life to the fullest; He arohanui ngā tamariki nohinohi/Together we live, love, and learn. This is carried through the school values of, Whakapono/Faith, Tumako/Hope, Aroha/Love and Manahou/Joy. 

St John the Evangelist Catholic School’s strategic priorities for improving outcomes for learners are:

• Catholic Special Character and Education
• wellbeing for all
• culturally responsive and professional learning for Kaiarahi/leaders and Kaiako/ teachers to embed effective pedagogy and practice
• learning and teaching
• community engagement.

You can find a copy of the school’s strategic and annual plan on St John the Evangelist Catholic School’s website.

ERO and the school are working together to evaluate how well the school implements and embeds their revised culturally responsive curriculum focussed on ensuring equitable outcomes for all ākonga/leaners.

The rationale for selecting this evaluation is: 

• the evaluation aligns directly to the newly developed 2023 Strategic Plan and National Education Learning Priorities (NELP), that will guide the school for the next 3 years
• a school focus on building capacity and capability supported by kāhui ako goals
• the refreshed Catholic religious education curriculum
• school wide intentionality in developing a contextualised, relationally based local curriculum. 

The school expects to see:

• kaiako’s cultural understanding of ākonga and their learning needs further developed to include building relationships with ākonga whānau
• ākonga build capability and agency in their learning, and through their progress they experience success in their achievement
• learner profiles providing clear pathways of progress, which can include acceleration practices which supports equitable ākonga outcomes
• consistent kaiako practices and processes that include building capability and agency whilst embedding challenge and high expectations into the teaching and learning focussed on ensuring excellent ākonga outcomes.

Strengths 

The school can draw from the following strengths to support the school in its goal to ensure equitable outcomes for all ākonga/leaners through a culturally responsive curriculum:

• ākonga value their school and the experiences they are involved in 
• ākonga are respectful of each other, which supports positive social and emotional relationships
• diverse, caring and passionate teachers who value every child’s uniqueness
• collaborative and inclusive leadership
• the school community has fully connected with the Parish.

Where to next?

Moving forward, the school will prioritise: 

• building even greater connection with ākonga language, culture, and identity 
• developing the learner profiles and transition profiles to further support the local curriculum
• improving ākonga attendance which in turn, improves engagement and is central to learner progress and achievement 
• continuing to develop the core capabilities of teachers so that they are empowered to effectively teach across the revised curriculum 
• consult further with whanau to better understand their aspirations for their tamariki.

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

11 December 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