Education

The Government has listened to pleas from schools to lift a freeze on funding for day-to-day costs.

In last year’s Budget, former education minister Hekia Parata announced a shift away from the traditional 2 per cent increase in schools’ operational funding in favour of a targeted approach.

The new policy identified 150,000 at-risk kids. But the model drew a lot of criticism given the Government didn’t attach any accountability measures to the funding and didn’t tell principals which students the money – about $1.79 per student – was specifically for.

Newly appointed Education Minister Nikki Kaye has responded by delivering a $60.5 million boost to operational funding.

Also, schools with high numbers of at-risk students will receive an additional 2.67 per cent increase in targeted funding, taking their total increase to almost 4 per cent.

The targeted funding model is seen as a precursor to what will eventually be a new way of funding schools across the board as the Government goes through the final stages of scrapping school deciles.

The Budget has delivered $1.1 billion of new operating funding over the next four years and an additional $392.4m of capital funding.

Part of that investment is $386m over four years for early childhood education. The funding boost will provide a further 31,000 early learning places and $35.5m in targeted funding to support children most at risk of under-achievement.

The Government has also put a focus on students with special learning needs and providing more teacher aide hours. An extra 625 students per year will receive teacher aide support.

A new programme for parents and teachers of young children with autism is also being funded as part of the Budget 2017 social investment package. It includes $4.2m to extend the Incredible Years programme to parents and teachers of autistic children aged 2 to 5.

An investment of $456.5m will be made in school property, with most of it going to Auckland. – Jo Moir