Source: New Zealand Government
Associate Education Minister David Seymour welcomes the Education Review Office’s (ERO) report showing that parent and student attitudes to school attendance have improved under this Government.
This is a strong, scalable and robust report. It is based on a survey of 14,600 students, parents, teachers and school leaders. It follows a similar survey in 2022, giving comparable data.
“School attendance matters for the future of this country, and we are fixing it. When the Government takes education seriously, so do parents, students, and schools,” Mr Seymour says.
“The data shows rising attendance every term this Government has been in power. In Term 2 2025 58.4 per cent of students attended school regularly, compared to 39.6 per cent in Term 2 of 2022. ERO’s report released today identifies the three main reasons for this.
“The first reason is the actions of schools and school leaders. 93 per cent of teachers and leaders report setting clear expectations with students and parents around attendance. The report found that when these expectations were clear about why school attendance is important, they were more effective.
“Many schools have also already implemented their own attendance management plan, aligned with the Stepped Attendance Response (STAR). It will be mandatory for all schools to have theirs in place by Term 1 of 2026.
“When schools take attendance seriously, so do students. Three-quarters of students now think daily attendance is important, compared to two-thirds in 2022. More students also think education is important for their future. The number of students who say they never want to miss school has almost doubled, from 15 per cent in 2022 to 28 per cent now.
“Parents place a higher value on their children attending school than three years ago. Parents are 10 percentage points less likely to be comfortable with their child missing more than a week or more of school.
“As our attendance action plan continues to roll out, I expect attitudes and attendance rates to continue to improve.
“At the start of next year frontline attendance services will be more accountable, better at effectively managing cases, and data-driven in their responses. To achieve this, they will soon have access to a new case management system and better data monitoring, and their contracts will be more closely monitored.
Budget 2025 included $140 million of additional funding package to improve attendance over the next four years.
“Attending school is the first step towards achieving positive educational outcomes. Positive educational outcomes lead to better health, higher incomes, better job stability and greater participation within communities. These are opportunities that every student deserves.”
