Ngāi Te Rangi chief executive Paora Stanley says trying to take parents to court is 'ridiculous'. Photo / Alex Cairns
A new school truancy policy that could see parents of chronically absent students prosecuted will “punish poor kids”, Tauranga iwi leader Paora Stanley says.
It comes as a new Education Review Office report says chronic absenteeism has doubled in a decade, and some Tauranga colleges say finding solutions is difficult.
The “stepped attendance response system” was introduced in September by Act Party leader and Associate Education Minister David Seymour.
In a statement, Seymour said notifications and interventions would escalate as absence time increased. Each school must develop their own version of the system and start using it from 2026.
In one example he provided, after 15 absent days, steps towards prosecuting parents could be considered.
Stanley, chief executive of Tauranga Moana iwi Ngāi Te Rangi, said taking parents to court, which could result in hefty fines, was “ridiculous”, “heavy-handed” and would “punish poor kids”.
Under the Education and Training Act 2020, parents can be fined up to $30 for each school day missed, up to $300 for a first offence, and $3000 for a second or subsequent offence.
In Stanley’s view, fining parents was “punishing the poor because they’re poor”.
“Some of the kids are not going to school because somebody’s going to look after the children. After all, the adults have to go to work. However wrong that is, they don’t have choices.”
Stanley said the iwi worked alongside struggling whānau to address issues leading to absenteeism.
Tauranga-based Labour list MP and education spokeswoman Jan Tinetti said when she was principal of Merivale School she saw children and whānau experiencing “unimaginable” trauma.
Tinetti said truancy had been an issue in Tauranga for many years, usually driven by complex factors “outside of the school gate”.
Getting to school daily was simply not the biggest priority and fining parents would make a complex situation worse.
“Understanding and working to support families through their situation is the answer.”
Seymour said the Ministry of Education would only look to prosecute those adults being genuinely obstructive or neglectful, rather than facing danger or barriers.
“If parents are following the law and trying to send their children to school, they will not have to worry about government intervention.”
He said attendance rates were improving from when Tinetti was Education Minister but there was still work to do.
The Government saw education as a path out of poverty so it was “doing everything in our power to get children to school, especially if they’re disadvantaged”.
“No matter someone’s socio-economic background, location, or ethnicity, getting your children to school is the best thing you can do to ensure they have a bright future.”
An Education Review Office report on school absence released in October revealed absenteeism doubled in the last decade.
In Term 2, more than 80,000 students missed more than three weeks of school, and one in 10 were chronically absent – missing more than 30% of a term.
Students in unstable housing were more likely to be chronically absent.
The Salvation Army has 27 transitional houses in Tauranga, and 23 resident families with school-age children, Tauranga Community Ministries said in a statement.
Children without a stable home – especially during their early years – were impacted academically, physically, emotionally, and socially.
Moving between temporary homes in different suburbs could result in changing schools and “non-attendance”.
Older children were more likely to have several school changes and long absences, leading to “truanting, getting into trouble, and eventually ‘dropping out’ of mainstream education”.
Pāpāmoa College tumuaki/principal Iva Ropati said his school struggled to understand the causes of some “very ordinary” attendance data.
It did not have significant evidence to suggest poverty, housing, employment, or transport costs were major barriers to attendance.
Parents and caregivers reported no serious issues motivating their child to go to school.
“It leaves the school with some head-scratching with regard to fixing the problem.”
Ropati said there was a belief that Covid-19 shifted student attitudes and learning from home made them feel going to school was not critical, but he did not believe this was widespread among his students.
The school community understood achievement was impacted by irregular attendance.
“We often promote some very hard-hitting facts linking potential NCEA success to the number of days absent for young people at our kura.”
The school would continue working to address absenteeism by strengthening reporting processes, increasing staffing, and working with parents, caregivers, iwi and other stakeholders.
Ōtūmoetai College tumuaki/principal Russell Gordon said social issues such as housing instability and poverty contributed to absenteeism, as did physical and mental health challenges.
Gordon said more students travelling overseas during term time was another significant factor.
“I have signed at least 100 letters over the past two months acknowledging parents’ requests to take their children out of school,” he said.
While students benefitted from seeing the world, “this undeniably impacts our attendance statistics”.
Gordon said the college worked with families to support students’ return to school, often engaging external support services.
An ERO recommendation to make learning more relevant and engaging was “well-intentioned but challenging”, Gordon said. New maths and literacy requirements for Year 10s had increased pressure on students and “strict assessment windows” made it harder to create an engaging learning environment.
He said more government support for families facing economic hardship, better cross-agency collaboration, and more mental health resources in schools would help address root causes of absenteeism.
Mount Maunganui College tumuaki/principal Alastair Sinton said much of the ERO report report aligned with the college’s experience.
He said improved resourcing from successive governments had seen attendance improve.
“However, improving attendance is a bit like turning an ocean liner; progress can be slow, and there is a risk that slow progress can be seen as no progress. In the interest of efficiency, I hope that existing resourcing and measures are given sufficient time to embed before being cut.”
Sinton said the report identified that many factors outside of school influence attendance, so a multi-agency approach was needed.
Sinton said the college saw behaviour patterns within families throughout a student’s schooling, and it could be hard for secondary schools to change those after eight years.
“That is not to say we can’t make a difference. We continually review our systems and teaching and learning programmes to ensure they remain relevant to our learners and the parental expectations of us as a school.”
Sinton said building safe, inclusive schools with positive learning cultures remained a focus for his and other schools. Youth mental health, an issue identified in the ERO report, remained a “hugely complex” social issue that schools were “scrambling to grapple with”.
“We play an essential role, but the level of expertise to best support many young people facing challenges rests with professionals outside our sector.”
Kaitlyn Morrell is a multimedia journalist for the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post. She has lived in the region for several years and studied journalism at Massey University. Sonya Bateson is a Bay of Plenty-based regional content leader with more than a decade of experience reporting in the Bay of Plenty region.
Police say they are following lines of inquiry to catch the offender.