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ERO looked at how new principals are doing in their first five years in the role. We found that new principals are not always well prepared, and many are not confident about their new range of responsibilities. School boards can make a big difference in setting new principals up for success.

The disruptions caused by Covid-19 over the last two years have been challenging and long lasting. ERO’s new report, Learning in a Covid-19 World: The Impact of Covid-19 on Pacific Learners, looks closely at the achievement, attendance, mental health and wellbeing, school contexts, and education pathways of Pacific learners over this time. The report shines a light on challenges and shares successful strategies.

Receiving a quality education, from early childhood education (ECE) through to secondary school, positively affects how well all children and young people do at school and in life – from academic achievement and earning potential to health and wellbeing. Education is even more critical for disabled learners. When disabled learners receive a quality, inclusive education they are more likely to achieve better outcomes, to complete secondary schooling and to go on to further study and employment.

This guide draws on findings from ERO’s report Long Covid: Ongoing impacts of Covid-19 on schools and learning, providing what we learned from surveying principals, teachers, and learners in 2023.

Going to school is critical for our children’s futures. The evidence is clear that every day of school matters – missing school leads to lower achievement. Aotearoa New Zealand has lower attendance than other countries and, alarmingly, attendance is falling. This short summary looks at some of the reasons why.

Since 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic has caused significant disruption to schools, their staff, learners, and whānau. Three years on from the start of the pandemic, this report has found significant and concerning ongoing impacts on learners’ progress, particularly for learners in poorer communities, and on teachers and principals.

Science is important – we rely on science and scientific thinking in almost every endeavour in our modern society. High quality science education at school is essential for learners who want a career in science, but it is also important for all learners to help them understand the scientific issues that whānau, communities, and nations face. Issues such as climate change, healthy living, and innovation all depend on science.

This short report, aimed at secondary school leaders, sets out how prepared students and schools felt ahead of the Covid-19 lockdown in August and provides recommendations for how schools can support their students as they return to the classroom. 

This short report, aimed at primary school leaders, sets out how prepared students and schools felt ahead of the Covid-19 lockdown in August and provides recommendations for how schools can support their students as they return to the classroom. 

Starting school is a major childhood event. It can be an exciting time for children and their families. But it is a big change and can be an uncertain time. Since 2018, schools have been able to have children start in groups at certain dates during the year. This is called cohort entry. ERO found that cohort entry has a range of benefits for children’s wellbeing and learning, schools’ ability to structure transitions more easily, and for teachers due to fewer disruptions and more time to teach.

ERO looked at how education is meeting the needs of learners from ethnic communities and how schools can embrace increasing ethnic diversity. In this guide we share findings from our research, as well some practical things that school leaders and teachers can do to support better inclusion of learners from ethnic communities.

Early childhood education services had to quickly adapt to changing requirements and periods of uncertainty due to Covid-19 in 2020. ERO undertook work to understand how this affected early childhood education services. This report presents our findings on how Covid-19 impacted children, whānau and services, how services responded and what they learnt, and the challenges that services expect they might face in future alert level changes.