Te Tipua 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 

Te Tipua School is a small rural primary school located between Gore and Winton, in Central Southland. The school provides education for learners from Years 1 to 8. A new principal began at the school in Term 2, 2024. There have been multiple changes in leadership since 2022.

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 expected curriculum levels in reading, writing and mathematics; high achievement rates have been sustained over time.
• Outcomes are equitable across all groups of learners.
• Most students attend school regularly; the school is not yet meeting the Ministry of Education’s attendance target.

Conditions to support learner success

• Leadership is beginning to plan and coordinate the school’s curriculum; expectations for consistent high-quality teaching and learning are not yet shared.
• Leadership is beginning to use evidence to plan for school improvement; including identifying strategies to improve learner outcomes.
• Leadership is developing relationships with other education providers to increase opportunities for learning and success. 

• Students benefit from experienced teachers who know them well and tailor programmes to meet their specific learning needs.
• Leaders and teachers provide effective support programmes for students who need additional support to learn and progress at an appropriate pace in literacy.
• Teachers and leaders need to design and agree on a shared local curriculum that clarifies progressions for learners across curriculum levels; priority needs to be given to enacting a consistent approach to assessment in literacy and mathematics.

• Teachers engage regularly with parents to discuss learners’ strengths, needs and interests which extends learner success and wellbeing.
• Student feedback and ideas are gathered and increasingly used to inform programmes and initiatives in the classroom.
• Leaders and teachers are taking steps to give effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi; te reo Māori is increasingly woven into teaching practice.

Part B: Where to next?

The agreed next steps for the school are to: 

• clarify and agree schoolwide expectations for high quality teaching and learning
• review classroom programmes to identify what is working well and where to next to improve progress, achievement and attendance
• consolidate approaches for reading, writing and mathematics so that learners experience a coherent learning pathway as they progress through the school
• rationalise strategic planning so that it reflects agreed measures of success and targets appropriate improvement priorities that focus on outcomes for learners. 

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

Within six months:

• trustees and staff identify improvement priorities and establish appropriate measures of success for attendance and achievement
• leaders deliberately plan for gathering evidence that enables effective monitoring and reporting against identified improvement priorities
• leaders align organisational systems and processes to support curriculum delivery and robust assessment decisions.

Every six months:

• leaders and teachers ensure plans for consistent, effective and responsive teaching strategies are embedded across the school
• leaders and teachers monitor and evaluate the impact of teaching strategies on outcomes for learners.

Annually:

• leaders report learner progress, achievement and wellbeing information to the board to enable data scrutiny and increasingly effective strategic decision making
• leaders and teachers plan for strategic professional learning and development to continue to strengthen teaching and to build evaluation capability.

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

• consistent, responsive teaching strategies that improve and sustain excellent and equitable outcomes for learners
• a robust cycle of continuous improvement supported by the strengthened evaluation capability of leaders, teachers and the school board
• improved and sustained student 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

Sharon Kelly 
Director of Schools (Acting)

8 May 2025

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