Tua Marina School

School Evaluation Report

Tēnā koutou e mau manawa rahi ki te kaupapa e aro ake nei, ko te tamaiti te pūtake o te kaupapa. Mā wai rā e kawe, mā tātau katoa.

We acknowledge the collective effort, responsibility and commitment by all to ensure that the child remains at the heart of the matter.

Context 

Tua Marina School is located is in Tuamarina township, close to Blenheim. It provides education for students in Years 1 to 8. A newly appointed principal is guiding the school towards its vision of working together to grow a healthy and happy community where every learner succeeds.

There are two parts to this report.

Part A: An evaluative summary of learner success and school conditions to inform the school board’s future strategic direction, including any education in Rumaki/bilingual settings. 

Part B: The improvement actions prioritised for the school’s next evaluation cycle. 

Part A: Current State 

The following findings are to inform the school’s future priorities for improvement.

Learner Success and Wellbeing 

• Most students achieve at or above curriculum expectations in reading and mathematics, and less than half achieve in writing.
• Māori student achievement is higher than their school peers in reading and mathematics. 
• Disparity for boy’s progress and achievement remains in reading and writing.
• Less than half of all students attend school regularly; the school is not yet meeting the Ministry of Education attendance target.

Conditions to support learner success

• Leaders gather and analyse a wide range of student achievement and wellbeing information; informative reports to the board strengthens goal setting and plans for ongoing improvement.
• Leaders have strengthened guidelines and expectations for consistent assessment practices; achievement information is now reliable and sufficient to identify areas for improvement.
• Leaders increasingly use achievement information to select appropriate professional development; improvements in teaching practice are targeted to students learning needs. 

• Learners benefit from orderly learning environments; teachers actively support them to engage and apply new learning. 
• Teachers and leaders have established useful plans to meet individual learners needs and progress and achievement is tracked and monitored well; continuing to build knowledge and understanding of effective literacy strategies is a priority. 
• Teachers and leaders proactively identify and draw on community resources to enhance student learning opportunities, engagement and wellbeing. 

• The board and leaders effectively consult with the community and gather their aspirations for improvement; this informs strategic priorities.
• Parents and whānau value the wide range of opportunities that enable them to be actively involved in their children’s learning.
• Staff know learners well and work together to provide purposeful, well-paced learning opportunities for all learners. 

Part B: Where to next? 

The agreed next steps for the school are to: 

• strengthen leaders’ and teachers’ knowledge and use of effective literacy strategies to raise student achievement in writing
• engage with students, parents and whānau to identify strategies to improve regular attendance at school
• develop a more targeted and strategic approach to evaluating school priorities for ongoing improvement.

The agreed actions for the next improvement cycle and timeframes are as follows.

Within three months:

• teachers undertake professional development in literacy
• consult with students and parents to understand attendance issues and develop an improvement plan
• research what effective internal evaluation looks like and develop a shared approach for leaders and teachers to review what is working to improve outcomes and who for.

Every six months:

• review the impact of targeted approaches to further improve rates of regular attendance and report this to the school board
• staff take deliberate action in response to emerging trends, with particular attention to those learners at risk of not achieving in literacy and those with lower rates of regular attendance.

Annually:

• leaders, with staff, analyse and report to the board on attendance and student achievement in reading, writing and mathematics and used to inform ongoing improvements
• review longitudinal data to understand shifts in trends and patterns of student attendance, progress, achievement and wellbeing to monitor the sustainability of improvements
• evaluate the impact of the agreed teaching and learning practices and professional development.

Actions taken against these next steps are expected to result in: 

• improved achievement outcomes for students in writing 
• improved equity between groups of students, particularly boys in reading and writing
• more students engaging in learning and attending regularly
• a fully embedded evaluation process to inform strategic direction.

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

Me mahi tahi tonu tātau, kia whai oranga a tātau tamariki
Let’s continue to work together for the greater good of all children

Shelley Booysen
Director of Schools

30 October 2024 

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