Southland Boys’ High 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

Southland Boys’ High School is a Year 7 to 13 composite school for boys in Invercargill. The school’s vision is to give all learners a high-quality, culturally responsive, safe, seamless and inclusive education. The school board owns and operates the adjacent boarding hostel, Coldstream. At the time of this review the school was recruiting for a new principal.

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 three years, ERO and the school worked together to evaluate the extent to which implementation of an effective teaching profile supports all students to have meaningful, sufficient and equitable opportunities to learn.

Expected Improvements and Findings

The school expected to see:

The design of a Southland Boys’ High School teacher profile focused on improving outcomes for learners and the systematic evaluation of this against the school’s student profile.

• Reasonable progress has been made in researching and designing both a graduate student and effective teaching profile.
• Both profiles are in early stages of being introduced to teachers and students.
• Leaders have been preparing for implementation through active promotion of the school’s values and history (Māori and European) through school curriculum and other systems.

Strengthened processes that build collaborative teacher practices to ensure all students have meaningful, sufficient and equitable opportunities to engage and learn.

• Significant progress has been made in strengthening structures and processes that support collaborative teacher practice focused on improving student outcomes.
• Middle leaders have clearer roles and responsibilities and teachers of junior students meet regularly to collaboratively monitor the progress of students and plan effective teaching strategies.
• Systems tracking and reporting on student learning are more effectively used to identify and respond to any student at risk of poor outcomes.

The greatest shift that has occurred in response to the school’s action, is improved engagement in learning for junior students in Years 9 and 10, shown in improved attendance levels and high rate of achievement of the school’s new junior certificate.

Part B: Current State

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

Learner Success and Wellbeing

Learning and engagement outcomes are increasingly excellent and equitable

• The majority of junior students make expected or better progress in literacy and mathematics and most achieve the school’s Year 9 internal achievement certificate; however more information is needed about achievement levels in literacy and numeracy for Year 7 to 10.
• Most students attain National Certificate in Educational Achievement (NCEA) Levels 1 and 2; an increasing proportion of learners attain NCEA Level 3 and University Entrance and an increasing proportion gain qualification endorsements, particularly at Levels 2 and 3.
• Learning outcomes in national qualifications are equitable for Māori in NCEA Level 1 and 3 with some ongoing inequity at Level 2 and University Entrance; outcomes for Pacific learners were equitable in Levels 2, 3 and University Entrance in 2023.
• Attendance rates are improving but not yet at the Ministry of Education’s target; focused action by the school prioritises regular attendance.

Conditions to support learner success

Leaders have high expectations for the achievement, progress and wellbeing of all learners and promote collective responsibility for learner outcomes.

• Leaders are strengthening relational trust and effective collaboration at every level of the school community to achieve the strategic vision and improvement goals.
• Leaders are strengthening systems, programmes and practices to better promote all learners’ wellbeing, inclusion, confidence in their identity, language and culture, and engagement in learning.
• Leadership uses evidence to plan and monitor aspects of the school’s strategic improvement cycle and are increasingly evaluating the effectiveness of strategies designed to improve learner outcomes.

Curriculum and teaching are increasingly responsive to students’ learning needs, interests, aspirations, culture and identity.

• Teachers create orderly and collaborative learning environments, provide purposeful and well-paced learning opportunities and encourage questioning and problem-solving; relationships between teachers and learners are increasingly founded on respect and mutual trust and allow learners to seek help when required.
• Teachers are developing and strengthening shared understandings of effective, relationship-based teaching strategies to promote all learners’ inclusion, engagement and success in learning.
• Common assessment practices in Years 7 to 10 are developing and beginning to provide insights into learner progress and achievement at individual, class and whole-school levels; leaders and teachers use this information increasingly well to identify improvement priorities and to adapt teaching practice to respond to learners’ strengths and needs.

Improving outcomes for students and sustainable school improvement is well supported by a range of school conditions.

• Students report supportive connections across year levels and a strong sense of belonging and collective identity; there are many and varied opportunities for student leadership.
• Teachers communicate regularly with parents and whānau for shared understandings about learners’ strengths, learning needs, engagement, learning pathways, progress and achievement.
• Partnerships with employers and vocational and training providers are well used to support learners’ pathways and transitions to work and further learning.
• Leaders and teachers engage with professional learning opportunities that align with school improvement goals and learner needs; the next step is to use evidence to monitor anticipated changes in practice and learner outcomes.

Part C: Where to next?

The agreed next steps for the school are to:

• develop and deliver a school-wide literacy and numeracy strategy to raise student achievement in NCEA literacy and numeracy
• strengthen collection and analysis of literacy and numeracy progress and achievement information to identify students needing additional support, evaluate the effectiveness of programmes, initiatives and teaching and inform planning for improvement
• further embed the school’s expectations for relationship-based and inclusive teaching in school systems to foster learner attendance, engagement, sense of belonging and pride in culture and identity.

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

Within six months:

• develop implementation planning for school-wide literacy and numeracy strategies
• engage staff in professional learning on structured literacy strategies and other school-wide strategies to raise achievement in literacy and numeracy
• further develop assessment practices and systems for collecting and monitoring data to know about progress and achievement in literacy and numeracy and to inform next steps in teaching and learning
• develop and introduce tools for evaluating teacher practice against expectations for responsive, relational and inclusive practice to build an understanding of current practice.

Every six months:

• monitor implementation of school-wide literacy and numeracy strategies, including the effectiveness of professional learning opportunities for staff, to know what is working and what is getting in the way
• leaders and teachers analyse progress and achievement data to know about the effectiveness of teaching programmes and strategies, identify students needing additional support and to plan next teaching and learning steps.

Annually:

• analyse schoolwide literacy and numeracy achievement, use this data to report to the board, and plan actions that will improve the achievement and learning outcomes of all students
• drawing on a range of evidence, including the perspectives of learners, their families and staff, evaluate how well responsive, relationship-based, inclusive teacher practice is supporting learners’ attendance, engagement, belonging and pride in culture and identity
• use the above evidence to identify priorities for professional learning that will support all staff to deliver the school’s expectations for responsive, relationship-based, inclusive teaching and effective literacy teaching.

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

• an increasing proportion of learners achieving the NCEA literacy and numeracy requirements
• students needing additional support to achieve, effectively identified and supported through tailored interventions to accelerate their learning in literacy and numeracy
• board, leaders and teachers using evidence well to know about the effectiveness of strategies to raise achievement in literacy and numeracy
• students experiencing responsive, relationship-based, inclusive teaching that fosters their attendance, engagement, sense of belonging and pride in culture and identity.

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

26 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