What a change in attendance

This is the latest data. Regular attendance dropped 16 percentage points or 25% from 2017 to 2023. A disaster. Since 2023 it has increased 17 percentage points or 37%. In real terms there are 157,000 more students now regularly attending school.

For Māori students regular attendance dropped 17 percentage points or 34% from 2017 to 2023. What do you think that will do to equity!. Since 2023 it has increased 16 percentage points or 47%. In real terms there are 15,000 more Māori students now regularly attending school.

This is the proportion of students absent for more than 12 weeks a year – so all but dropped out. It peaked at 14% under Labour, and even worse was at 24% for Māori students. Labour will die in a ditch over co-governance of water, but allowed 1 in 4 Māori students to drop out of school.

There are 39,000 fewer students chronically absent in June 2026 than in June 2023. Again a great achievement.

Of course still a long way to go, but the trend is very very clear.