User-pays out of control, says head

Northcote College technician David Madjar films Year 12 students James Pettit and Jana Smyth. Photo / Kenny Rodger

Vicki Barrie doesn't mind asking parents to dip into their pockets for some things but she's adamant the user-pays trend in schools is out of control.

"It has gone too far," says the Northcote College principal, who first went public on the school funding issue last year.

"We are not fundraising to buy a new minivan. We are fundraising to deliver the curriculum."

She is aware that her comments have made her a political target, notably from former education minister Chris Carter, who stepped up his criticism again this week. So she agrees to an invitation to back up her argument with a tour of the school.

In a classroom across the carpark from Ms Barrie's modest white office - which she re-painted herself to save money - fulltime media studies technician David Madjar is working on a suite of computers and video cameras.

The school depends on him, says Ms Barrie, to maintain the equipment and for specialist jobs, such as filming and editing drama presentations, which students submit for NCEA.

But it has no government funding to pay his $20-an-hour wages, let alone offer him a permanent job.

"He's currently being paid with money from an art exhibition that we had last year."

On the far side of the school, a 50-year-old science classroom has just been rewired so the teacher can run a projector off his laptop.

Unfortunately, Ms Barrie can't find the money for the projector.

"It would seem to most people that in an organisation this big I should be able to find $2000 to put a projector in that room. I can't. We have cut everything from the budget."

She says the core problem is that schools are underfunded by the Government, which forces them to rely on money from parents and the wider community.

When an economic downturn strikes, it becomes impossible to make ends meet because parents and local businesses no longer have any extra money to give.

The result is a cost-saving drive, which can affect students' education.

The school has had to scale back an intensive two-teacher programme for some Year 9 (third form) pupils, which will still include English and social studies but not science.

At this stage, it has dropped a 50-year tradition of giving books to winners at the prize-giving.

Washing the school buildings, which costs $14,000 a year, was not even an option. "That sort of thing always goes first."

Northcote College runs on about $10 million a year, including $5 million for teacher salaries. Ms Barrie, says the remaining $5 million is evenly split between the school's operating grant from the Government and locally raised money, which is starting to dry up.

The school asks parents for voluntary donations of $250 a student or $500 a family, plus an extra $100 or more to an area of their choice, including sport, the arts and support for other families who are struggling to pay.

The first sign of trouble came last year when the financial hardship fund ran out.

This year, the school has downgraded its target from $170,000 to $155,000 and Ms Barrie says they still expect to fall short.

"The finance office tell me they've had calls saying someone in the family has been made redundant and they won't be able to pay."

Like many high-decile schools, Northcote also relies heavily on fee-paying international students, who contribute $700,000.

Its other main sources of income are sponsorship, which are harder to find, and compulsory fees for costs such as classroom materials.

Ms Barrie resents the fact that she, her students, teachers and school board members have to spend so much time finding the money to pay for school activities, instead of concentrating on teaching and learning.

She mentions a robotics competition, which 87 students signed up for, in three days. But it will cost $10,000 for them to take part, so the students' main focus has been to raise the money rather than design their robots.

"The real problem, I think, is that it takes the focus of boards of trustees, principals and teachers away from teaching and learning," says Ms Barrie, "because we are constantly scrambling to try and balance the budget."

NORTHCOTE COLLEGE
ROLL: 1300
DECILE: 9
DONATIONS: $250 per student, $500 per family
GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS GRANT: $2.5 million
LOCALLY RAISED MONEY: $2.5 million