West Gore 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 

West Gore School provides education for students in Years 1 to 6. Its mission statement is: ‘Our Place to Grow – E Kikiri Tātou’.

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 

Since the previous ERO report of April 2023, ERO and the school worked together to evaluate how effectively the school’s play-based curriculum strengthened and developed students’ ‘skills for growing’ - key competencies for learning.

Expected Improvements and Findings

The school expected to see:

Excellent and equitable outcomes across the curriculum particularly for Māori learners.

• The school’s curriculum effectively strengthens learners’ ‘skills for growing’; this is a result of well-planned responsive teaching and meaningful assessment evidence used to inform decision making.
• Learners’ ‘skills for growing’ are improving for most learners.

Teachers better responding to the unique needs, interests, and abilities of each student to improve student engagement and personalise learning pathways.

• Useful ‘skills for growing’ assessment frameworks now provide clarity for all stakeholders, resulting in a shared language of learning across the school and a framework to support increasingly cohesive teaching practices.
• Teachers and learners make judgments about learner progress and achievement in relation to the rubrics and use these judgments well to identify next learning steps; this information is shared with parents and whānau.
• Teachers intentionally structure learning and effectively using their knowledge of learners’ strengths, needs and interests to engage learners in learning is now an embedded practice.
• Leaders have developed tools to help them make sense of schoolwide ‘skills for growing’ data; this information is used well to capture learnings and inform future planning.

Other Findings

The greatest shift that occurred in response to the school’s action has been improved clarity for teachers about how to deliver and assess ‘skills for growing’ across the school. Teachers and learners use the ‘skills for growing’ assessment frameworks assessment frameworks with increasing accuracy and purpose.

Part B: Current State

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

Learner Success and Wellbeing 

• Most students achieve curriculum expectations in reading and mathematics, and the majority of students achieve curriculum expectations in writing.
• Achievement rates have been sustained over time; achievement rates in writing are improving.
• Learning outcomes are not yet equitable for some groups of learners across the curriculum; this remains a priority for the school.
• The majority of learners attend school regularly; the school is not yet meeting the Ministry of Education target for regular attendance.

Conditions to support learner success

• Leaders relentlessly pursue targeted improvement goals that focus on outcomes for learners, particularly those learners at risk of underachievement.
• Leaders ensure effective planning, coordination and evaluation of the school’s curriculum and teaching; expectations for high-quality, evidence-informed teaching are clear, shared and systematically monitored.
• Leaders strategically use relevant internal and external expertise to embed capability building, improvement and innovation.

• Teachers notice, recognise and respond to learners’ strengths, needs and interests and design individual programmes to engage students in learning.
• Learners’ progress and achievement are closely monitored; evidenced-based interventions effectively target additional support to those learners who require this.
• Curriculum leaders effectively support teachers’ professional understanding and use of teaching resources and tools.

• Leaders and trustees use a range of high-quality evidence to evaluate the effectiveness of strategies to improve learner outcomes and wellbeing.
• Professional learning opportunities are strategically aligned with the school’s improvement goals and learners’ needs.
• Leaders and teachers routinely gather feedback and ideas from students and parents and use this information to inform planning for improvement.
• Te reo Māori, te ao Māori and tikanga Māori are increasingly woven through aspects of the school’s curriculum.

Part C: Where to next?

The agreed next steps for the school are to: 

• strengthen teaching practice to accelerate progress and improve equitable outcomes for Māori students' in reading, writing and mathematics
• increase the range of strategies used to improve students’ regular attendance.

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

Within six months:

• identify effective practice in literacy and mathematics teaching; use this to further enhance strategies for responding to learner needs, particularly for Māori students
• leaders and teachers review current strategies used to improve attendance to identify what is working well and what is not
• engage with parents and whānau to develop and implement a plan to bring about improvements to regular attendance.

Every six months:

• leaders continue to report to the board on student progress and achievement in reading, writing and mathematics to show the impact of planned actions to support excellent and equitable outcomes
• evaluate the effectiveness of strategies used to improve equitable outcomes in reading, writing and mathematics and make changes where needed
• evaluate the effectiveness of strategies used to improve attendance and make changes where needed.

Annually:

• leaders continue to use and report to the board student wellbeing, engagement, progress and achievement data to inform responsive decision making for continuous improvement
• report to the board on planned improvements in rates of regular attendance and prioritise goals accordingly.

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

• more students attending regularly
• increasingly excellent and equitable learning outcomes for all students.

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)

12 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