Kaikoura High School

Te Ara Huarau | School Profile Report

Background

This Profile Report was written within 24 months of the Education Review Office and Kaikoura High 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 

Kaikoura High School is located in the coastal township of Kaikōura and provides education to students in Years 7 to 13. The school is the managing school for the regional attendance service.

Kaikoura High School’s strategic priorities for improving outcomes for learners are to focus on building:

• Rangatiratanga | leadership
• Whai matauranga | curriculum, teaching and learning
• Whanaungatanga | connections and relationships
• Kaitiakitanga | stewardship.

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

ERO and the school are working together to evaluate how well leaders and teachers are implementing key strategies and practices to improve equity and engagement outcomes for priority learners.

The rationale for selecting this evaluation is:

• the variability, over time, of student achievement outcomes at NCEA, particularly through gaps in literacy capability
• the impact of local and national events on learner wellbeing, resilience and engagement
• the school’s readiness to implement a revised, localised curriculum and changes to NCEA.

The school expects to see strengthened evaluation practices that help the school and its community know the impacts of key decisions on all learners’ achievement and engagement outcomes, and inform ongoing school improvement.

Strengths

The school can draw from the following strengths to support the school in its goal to promote better equity and engagement for learners:

• collaboration with the community and Te Rūnanga o Kaikōura is enriching opportunities for learners to experience positive future pathways
• targeted professional development is building teacher capability in culturally responsive practices for equity and engagement for all learners
• an effective, targeted approach to acceleration of improvement in literacy for those students who most need this.

Where to next?

Moving forward, the school will prioritise:

• building consistency of practice in teaching literacy across the curriculum to ensure all learners are able to access the knowledge and skills they need for success
• strengthening school-wide practices that create a positive environment which promotes learner wellbeing, resilience and optimism
• building capability for leaders and the board to better monitor and regularly report against targets for improvement of equity an engagement.

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

26 May 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