Schools go into red as pupils blocked

When will it be safe for international students to return?

Some schools face deficits of up to $1.5 million after Government advice not to plan on new overseas students until 2022. Ministry of Education head Iona Holsted has told Auckland Grammar School headmaster Tim O’Connor in an email that “given the uncertainty of the border, if I was a principal I would plan for no students until 2022. This is conservative advice, but the converse would have been to give certainty of arrival in 2021, and that is not currently possible.”

Macleans College principal Steve Hargreaves, who had 320 overseas students last year, said he is planning on a deficit of $1.5m in the next 12 months. Epsom Girls’ Grammar School board chairman Chris Isles said his school faced a deficit of “close to $1m”.

O’Connor said Auckland Grammar would lose $1m next year if the border remains closed to students, and Mt Albert headmaster Pat Drumm said he was “in discussion with the staff that are directly related to that [overseas student] funding”.

All the schools said they have also cut school-funded capital spending such as building maintenance and computer upgrades.

Schools, universities and other institutes catering for New Zealand’s $5 billion international student sector had been hoping for a decision soon that would let them start recruiting students for summer programmes, or at least for the 2021 academic year.

Patrick Walsh of John Paul College in Rotorua, who chairs the School International Education Business Association (Sieba), said the “window” for recruiting most students for next year would close around September or October.

“We are concerned that countries are going to get the jump on us — Australia, Canada and England.”

Sieba and the Secondary Principals’ Association asked the Government in May for “emergency support” to retain the jobs of 1500 to 2000 school staff who recruit and support international students.

Isles said he has asked the Ministry of Education for a low- or no-interest loan scheme to help schools keep their staff until students return.

Education Minister Chris Hipkins said: “We are actively considering options to buffer the sharp decline in income. The pandemic is still raging overseas and our borders are our first line of defence against Covid-19. International students are, however, important to New Zealand and the Government will allow them to return when it’s safe to do so.”

Holsted said she still did not know when it would be safe.

“In the meantime, my advice has been to take a conservative approach and plan for a range of different scenarios. I am sure principals are already doing this.”