Students must behave says principal

By STUART DYE education reporter


The school with the highest disciplinary rate in Auckland wears the figures as a badge of honour.

Greenmeadows Intermediate in Manurewa is the only school to feature on two separate top 10 disciplinary lists of the region's schools.

It tops the stand-down list and has the sixth highest rate of suspensions.

But principal Warwick May said he was not ashamed of the statistics.

"I'm pleased it's come to the surface - it shows the public what we have to put up with," he said.

The school had no misplaced sense of pride and would not shy away from removing misbehaving children.

"We will not compromise on education and I make no apologies for that."

A stand-down is a temporary ban after which the student automatically returns to school. A suspension is the formal removal of a student from school until the board of trustees decides whether he or she can return.

The lists come after a Maxim Institute study, published in the Herald yesterday, showed that classroom discipline was parents' biggest concern about today's schools.

Greenmeadows had 187 stand-downs against a school roll of 611 in the last academic year. It is equivalent to a rate of 306 in 1000 students against a national average of 27 in 1000.

The school's suspension rate was 49 in 1000 where the national average was seven in 1000.

But Mr May said every disruptive child removed meant 29 others in a classroom got a better education.

"If children come to school ready to learn, we can perform miracles. If they aren't ready to learn we will deal with that," he said.

Many schools were faced with the same problems of having to act as social workers before beginning teaching, which was not acceptable.

Five years ago Greenmeadows was losing students through violence and bullying.

Today, parents and the community knew it was a safe environment, the school roll had grown and there were more teachers.

"Learning time is precious and the learning environment must be protected," said Mr May.

"We offer counselling, have teacher aides and a range of other opportunities for those misbehaving, but sometimes a short sharp shock message to parents is more effective."

Nationally the rate of stand-downs rose 9 per cent last year and suspensions dropped marginally. More principals are adopting the former disciplinary method as a "cooling-off" period rather than a suspension, with no guarantee the child is allowed to return.

The Auckland school with the highest rate of suspensions was Catholic school Hato Petera College - 142 in 1000 last year.

Principal Brother David McDonald said it was a rating that arose as a result of a one-off issue at the Northcote school last year involving drugs. "We had to deal with it and we did. We do not expect it to become an issue again."