School opts to close as roll falls to 8

A declining roll has led to the closure of a small Tararua school.

Pahı¯atua’s Hillcrest School has battled to turn around a falling roll in recent years and was expected to have about eight pupils next year, so the board of trustees requested it shut.

Hillcrest, which opened in 1964, will officially close on January 27.

Kevin Palmer was appointed as the school’s statutory manager last year.

He said the closure came following community consultation late last year and this year, as well as the board’s request for voluntary closure.

Palmer said the roll had been declining for a number of years and with five pupils moving on to secondary school next year, several others moving out of the district and with no new enrolments expected, next year’s roll would have been about eight pupils.

‘‘On the basis of these roll predictions and in the best interests of the pupils from a learning, achievement and social wellbeing perspective, the board took the difficult but logical decision that school closure was the best option, particularly as there are other nearby, quality schooling options available.’’

Pahı¯atua has two other schools – St Anthony’s School and Pahı¯atua School – and Mangatainoka, Ballance and Woodville schools are also nearby.

The remaining Hillcrest pupils who are of primary school age and staying in the district would be changing schools, Palmer said.

He said the school’s assets and resources would be transferred to other local schools, historical items would go to the Pahı¯atua Museum and other important documentation would be archived.

‘‘The responsibility for the school site and buildings pass from the board back to the Ministry of Education upon closure.’’

Several functions marked the last days of the school. Auckland Zoo has welcomed a stripy Christmas gift: a zebra foal.

The foal was born in the early hours of Christmas Eve.

It is the first zebra to be born at the zoo since 2010 and the 43rd since it opened in 1922.

Auckland Zoo said in a statement that the foal and its mother, 7-year-old Layla, were both doing well.

‘‘It’s early days so the team are monitoring them closely while they take this time to bond and the foal gets used to its whole new world of zebra, giraffe, humans and other creatures.’’

It was not yet known whether the newborn foal was male or female so a name had not yet been chosen.

Zebra pregnancies can be lengthy, stretching 12 or 13 months.

Foals usually stand within an hour of birth and can run with their herd within a few hours.

The zoo now has five zebra as part of the Australasian regional breeding programme. The others are female Itika (26 years old), male Carlo (11), and female twin sisters Layla and Dalila (7).