Tokotoko Solutions is one of two Alternative Education providers in Whangārei. Left, education lead Matthew Dennis and founder Isopo Samu. Photo / Michael Cunningham
Tokotoko Solutions is one of two Alternative Education providers in Whangārei. Left, education lead Matthew Dennis and founder Isopo Samu. Photo / Michael Cunningham
Alternative Education providers fear a lack of resources within the intervention programme is making further trouble for kids who have fallen out of mainstream schooling.
The programme's intention is to provide educational and pastoral support for students, aged 13 to 15, to ultimately transition them back to school, training, employmentor other education.
Matthew Dennis, education lead from Tokotoko Solutions - one of the two Alternative Education (AE) providers in Whangārei, said AE wasn't intended to be a destination but had become so.
By the time students realised they wanted to go back to school, the doors to mainstream education had closed, Dennis said.
"When young people are rocking up to school, the conditions for entry are ridiculous and setting them up for further failures in life."
He said many of the kids at Tokotoko Solutions had been "kicked out of a number of schools".
"[...] some of them are out of school for quite a long time. They are behind in education, social, and every aspect of life but there is a waiting list to get into the system."
Tokotoko Solutions education lead Matthew Dennis says the project set up to cater to the most vulnerable kids wasn't meant to be a destination. Photo / Michael Cunningham
Dennis said the traditional high-school environment prioritised literacy and numeracy assessments over anything else, despite diverse career opportunities existing worldwide.
"There is a lot of pressure and challenges on the education system, and the reason we exist, picking young people off the street, bringing them to our place, helping them learn, is because our mainstream education system isn't functioning for everyone."
Tokotoko Solutions founder Isopo Samu said parents based outside the region struggling with their children often sent them to their Northland grandparents, which added to the number of students needing AE locally.
Samu suggested the Ministry of Education should start to look at the attaching funding to each young person so that "wherever they go, the money goes with them".
"We are facilitating the delivery of the service and we can see the system is broken," he said.
"If you look at the AE education sector, we have got kids coming into Northland that fit the criteria but the funding stays down in the region."
Northland has funding for 140 AE student placements - Kaitāia (19), Taipa (5), mid-north (35), Whangārei (64), Dargaville (10) and Otamatea (7). Fourteen external providers have been contracted in the region since 2013, while three secondary schools deliver and manage the AE provision on their school site.
Ten per cent of the 127 students, placed in 2021, returned to school while the majority (31 per cent) were referred to Te Tai Tokerau Attendance Service for truancy.
The delivery of AE in Whangārei is unique as local high schools have pooled their funding to outsource the services to other providers, whereas the rest of Northland schools have an inbuilt AE programme.
Whangārei AE co-ordinator Jaime Crabb said Alternative Education funding was "minimal".
"Our funding has to cover everything the coaches provide – van drivers, food, etcetera."
Coaches - who doubled as counsellors, social workers, community connectors; sport and cultural specialists - were a lifeline available around the clock to help young people in the programme.
Whangārei Alternative Education co-ordinator Jamie Crabb says 64 AE seats in the district is not enough. Photo / Michael Cunningham
Crabb said alternative education wouldn't be needed if schools expanded how they offer education or were more personal in their approach.
The cap of 64 student placements in Whangārei's AE was not enough, she said. Last year, 30 students sat on the waitlist.
That meant 30 whānau with young people who weren't in the education system, she said.
"And those are the students we know of, which is just the tip of the iceberg."
Isabel Evans, Hautū (Leader) Te Tai Raro (North) from MoE, said typically the seats were filled to near or over capacity - managed with the host schools and through re-allocating vacated places.
"We experienced a drop in allocations in 2021 – probably as a result of Covid, which also affected attendance and engagement across New Zealand."
