Govt allocates $153m for charter schools
The Government is putting $153 million in funding over four years to open 15 new charter schools and convert 35 state schools into charter schools.
Associate Education Minister David Seymour said 35 state schools had expressed an interest in converting to charter schools.
The state schools to be converted, in 2025 and 2026, would be dependent on “demand and suitability”.
Seymour also said “there may well be state schools that are not performing turned into charter schools”.
The first charter schools are expected to be ready to open in the first term of 2025.
“Charter schools provide educators with greater autonomy, create diversity in New Zealand’s education system, free educators from state and union interference, and raise overall educational achievement, especially for students who are underachieving or disengaged from the current system,” he said.
“By focusing primarily on student achievement, charter schools allow sponsors and communities to take their own path getting there.”
Seymour said charter schools would largely be funded on a per student basis, “broadly equivalent to that for state schools with similar rolls and characteristics”.
When the legislation is introduced into Parliament in the next few months, the application process will open, and the negotiation period will start once the law passes.
Seymour said the first charter contracts “will be negotiated and signed before the end of the year so the first schools can open for term one 2025”.
When asked if he would like to eventually see the UK model in New Zealand, where council-maintained schools which were not achieving UK education standards could be forced to become charter schools, Seymour said, “we will see that happen and there may well be state schools that are not performing turned into charter schools”.
Asked whether schools not meeting attendance or academic achievement could be forced to become charter schools, Seymour said, “no, I'd say the school will continue but management that aren't actually getting the results that the whole community is depending on them to get, might see that we need new management at a particular site”.
There would be fixed-term contracts of 10 years to operate a charter school, with two rights of renewal for 10 years, providing conditions on the contract terms are met by the school.
Green Party education spokesperson Lawrence Xu-Nan called it a “vanity project”.
“The education of our children is a public good and is something that should not be tampered with for private gain.
“Handing this responsibility to the private sector showcases serious neglect and highlights the prioritisation of profit over people that is spearheading the direction of this Government.”
The ACT and National Party coalition agreement promised to ‘reintroduce partnership schools and introduce a policy to allow state schools to become partnership schools’.
Seymour announced last month that a charter school board to “guide the formation of the charter school model, so that the first schools can open in 2025”.
Charter schools were first introduced under a previous ACT coalition deal with National in 2011.
The state-funded private schools were run independently of the government by non-profits or businesses and catered primarily to “priority learners” – those who had historically struggled more.
Concerns were raised about a lack of accountability and financial mismanagement at some schools, and a lack of student achievement at others.
Most partnership schools were based in Auckland or Northland, where there was a greater concentration of high-risk students, and at its peak the country had about 23.
In 2018, the Labour government under then-education minister Chris Hipkins abolished charter schools.