Westport South School

Te Ara Huarau | School Profile Report

Background

This Profile Report was written within 15 months of the Education Review Office and Westport South 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 

Westport South School caters for students in years 1 to 8. The school values are HEART Honesty, Encouragement, Attitude, Respect and Together we can.  

Westport South School’s strategic priorities for improving outcomes for learners are for:

• all students to become capable communicators, with an emphasis on digital technology and te reo Māori and to live by the HEART values
• students to be effective thinkers and confident self managers
• the school to continue to improve teacher capability
• the school to provide a safe, inclusive and nurturing environment while upholding Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

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

ERO and the school are working together to develop a systematic and regular evaluation framework that will report against strategic targets for planned school wide improvement.

The rationale for selecting this evaluation is:

• a desire for all students to reach their potential and to accelerate student knowledge, skills and achievement
• to ensure effective systems are in place to support high quality teaching and learning within a broad localised curriculum
• to build a shared understanding of evaluation processes to support consistency of practice and use of achievement data
• to support a safe, inclusive and nurturing environment.

The school expects to see:

• learners experiencing success and reaching individual potential in a broad localised curriculum
• a localised curriculum that continually improves and responds to the learner, whanau and community aspirations
• all students living “HEART” values with staff supporting and enabling improved student outcomes in all curriculum areas
• Te Tiriti o Waitangi being upheld in all school settings.

Strengths

The school can draw from the following strengths to support the school in its goal to develop an evaluation framework that will report against strategic targets for planned school wide improvement.

• Staff enable individualised programmes and have a strength in personalising learning for student success.
• Established and effective positive behaviour for learning (PB4L) programme that is underpinned by the school values “HEART” prioritising student’s pastoral care.
• Positive relationships with whanau, external agencies, and the community extend authentic opportunities for teaching and learning.
• The development of systematic and inclusive practices with resourcing for all learners, especially those with diverse and high needs, ensures equitable opportunities to access and learn through the localised curriculum.

Where to next?

Moving forward, the school will prioritise continuing to:

• strengthen school wide knowledge and understanding of evaluation processes to better know the impact of their strategic priorities for improvement
• increase academic achievement, attendance, and engagement of all students
• collaborate with staff, participate in relevant Professional Learning and Development and opportunities to share practice, that will enable all students learning and wellbeing needs to be met.

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

13 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