Weston 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 

Weston School is in North Otago and provides learning for students from Years 1 to 8. The enviroschool curriculum underpins much of the way the school operates. The school’s mission statement is Learning together, caring about our future; Te ako tahi me te whakairo nui tō tatou anamata.

There are three parts to this report.

Part A: A summary of the findings from the most recent Education Review Office (ERO) report and/or subsequent evaluation. 

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

Part A: Previous Improvement Goals

Over the past 18 months, ERO and the school have been working together to evaluate the implementation of a localised curriculum that responds to the needs and aspirations of  ākonga, whānau and community, including enhancing literacy teaching and learning.

Expected Improvements and Findings

The school expected to see:

Increased student engagement and sense of belonging through relevant, authentic and contextualised learning programmes.

• Teachers plan engaging programmes that connect learners’ interests and abilities.
• Attendance rates have improved.

Consistency, coherence and effectiveness in the way the curriculum is delivered and evaluated across the school. 

• The school is moving towards greater consistency and coherence in curriculum design, delivery and evaluation; strategic systems and processes continue to support these improvements.
• Supporting all learners to gain foundational skills in literacy has had a positive impact on their progress rates across the school.

Students, parents and whānau are actively involved in the development, implementation and evaluation of a local curriculum.

• The school makes effective use of student and parent input to inform curriculum design decisions. 
• Students are becoming increasingly involved as decision makers in their own learning.
• Te ao, tikanga and mātauranga Māori are increasingly woven through many aspects of the school’s curriculum. 

The greatest shift that occurred in response to the school’s actions is the cohesive approach across the school to teaching literacy. This has improved the consistency in the use of teaching strategies, confidence and capability amongst teachers and placed a greater focus on supporting students with different learning needs. Accelerated progress rates for learners are evident.

Part B: Current State

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

Learner Success and Wellbeing

• The majority of students achieve curriculum expectations in reading, writing and mathematics; achievement rates are improving as new approaches to the teaching of literacy are becoming established.
• The school has yet to address continued inequity for some groups of learners, particularly in literacy outcomes for boys and Māori learners. 
• Most students are attending school regularly; targets are in place to reduce non-attendance rates and strategies are having a positive impact on attendance rates, including for Māori learners.

Conditions to support learner success

• Leaders foster a school culture of commitment to high quality teaching; this is having a positive impact on progress rates for the majority of students.
• Leaders and teachers are developing evaluative capabilities to better know and understand the impact of strategies on learner outcomes.

• Students’ identities, languages and cultures are reflected in the range of learning opportunities provided by teachers. 
• Year 7 and 8 students’ learning benefits from authentic connections with local industries. 
• Leaders and teachers identify learners who need additional support to progress at an appropriate pace; support programmes are becoming more effective.

• Leaders and teachers are increasingly using evaluative evidence to plan and implement actions for improved learner progress and achievement.
• The school has comprehensive and effective systems for collection and monitoring of students’ achievement information.
• Leaders and teachers are building a culture of reflection and collaborative inquiry to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning.

Part C: Where to next?

The agreed next steps for the school are: 

• teachers continue to develop consistent, effective and responsive literacy teaching practices to better meet the different learning needs of students
• leaders and teachers continue to focus on achieving more equitable outcomes for groups of priority learners by developing a better understanding of what is working well and what is not
• to continue with strategies that improve learners’ attendance rates.

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

Within six months:

• evaluate teachers’ collective progress towards embedding consistent, effective and responsive teaching practices school-wide
• develop more appropriate measures of success to evaluate the impact of interventions for priority learners

Every six months:

• evaluate the sufficiency of progress of priority groups of learners to ensure timely intervention to accelerate their progress rates against appropriate measures of success

Annually:

• report the progress and achievement information of priority groups of learners to the board in such a way that allows the effectiveness of specific interventions to be understood to support strategic decision making
• continue to prioritise initiatives that improve learners’ attendance rates

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

• consistent, effective and responsive teaching practices schoolwide, resulting in improved and increasingly equitable achievement outcomes for all learners in literacy
• successful interventions to accelerate progress rates of priority learners, resulting in more equitable achievement outcomes in literacy
• improved learner attendance. 

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

3 September 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