‘He iti te kopara ka rerere I te puhi o te kahikatea’

10 Mar 2025

New Attendance Requirements of Schools from The MOE Regarding Attendance.

Makuri School wishes to notify parents and caregivers of the following requirements. We anticipate that parents and caregivers may find these requirements unpopular. However it is something that we will be required to do. It is also very important to inform you as our parent community of the said requirements so that you are forewarned. 

Recent notification from our Student Management System (Edge) states that if a student is unjustifiably absent 5 or more times in a term they are added to a list. The school has to come up with an attendance intervention plan that is due 5 school days after the 5th day of unjustified absence for the term. The list of students will be automatically sent to the MoE daily, recording whether an intervention plan has been activated for the appropriate students.

The following are the codes and explanations that relate to an unjustified absence. These have been set by the Ministry of Education.

Codes:

?       Not in class               Unknown reason (A temporary code) This is the initial entry for a student not in class and the reason is unknown. It will be edited as relevant information becomes available about the reason for the absence. 

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T       Not in class                No information provided – truant (or throw-away explanation) An absence where either no information is provided, or the explanation is trivial (throwaway): 

Examples / comments:    

I went down to the river  
Tired  
Sleeping in and may or may not be there later. 

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E       Not in class                Student is absent. 

The reason is Explained, but Unjustified The explanation for the absence is accepted by the school as the reason for the absence. But the reason does not fit within the school's policy as a justifiable reason to take the student off school. 

Examples / comments:  

Visiting relatives - Student's education is the priority. The student can see relatives outside school hours.  
Taking a day off for their birthday - Student's education is the priority. 
Birthdays can be celebrated outside school hours.  

Visiting another school (if not organised by the school)  
Family appointments - Need to make other arrangements for someone to look after students / siblings. If you have difficulty with that, then perhaps there is some way for the school to help.  
Extra-curricular activities - These activities need to be arranged for outside school hours. 

Examples include:  Outside of school Sport/cultural training opportunities or exams during school hours for all or part of a period. For example: archery, dance, piano or equestrian. 

Students attending exams / training for external clubs / extracurricular activities during school hours.
Spirit of adventure, and Outward-bound absences (and other similar student experience opportunities with other recognised institutions) not organised through school. - The student and their family/whānau can choose to do this, however the school still must mark the absence as E. The only exception would be if it was school organised - as part of the planned PE curriculum for example. 
Tutoring - not school instigated  
Extended absences that exceed school policy for justified length. E.g. Absent for an excessive number of days following attending a funeral.  
Absences due to parental concerns that attendance at school is unsafe because of the risk of contracting COVID-19 should generally be considered unjustified.

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G      Not in class           Holiday during term time            When a student is on a New Zealand or overseas holiday during the school term, the absence is unjustified. A parent's note does not provide justification.  

Examples / comments: 

 Family weddings (overseas usually for an extended period) - Student's education is the priority. Parents can choose to take children to this event, but the school must mark it as G. This is important as it provides the school and the Ministry with a record of how much the student has had (or missed out on) the opportunity to learn at school. 
In exceptional family circumstances, depending on school policy, it could possibly be marked J (justified). 

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This is new for Makuri School as well. We will look at what is meant by an attendance intervention plan. However for the immediate time be warned that if your child has had a number of absences this term then you may be contacted by the school. If you have any concerns after reading this please contact the school. We are happy to work through any concerns that you may have.

For more information see the attachment or the link below from the Ministry please go to the following link.

https://www.education.govt.nz/our-work/overall-strategies-and-policies/attendance-and-engagement-strategy/additional-attendance-measures/#sh-Additional%20measures

 

14 Feb 2025

School Timetable Change.

 

Through recent discussions we have made a decision to change the times of the school day at Makuri School. This is to support the parents in getting children to various afterschool events.The distance to travel and appointment times, makes it a push to get to places on time.

 

The change is to move the timetable a quarter of an hour early. More specifically this means we will begin school at 8:45am and finish school at 2:45pm. 

To keep things simple we will keep our break-times the same:

Healthy snack at 10am

Morning tea at 11am.

Lunch at 1pm.

The Morning period will be slightly longer and the afternoon slightly shorter. 

In terms of bus delivery times, approximately 8:30am still works so no changes needed there.

 

If you have a query about this please contact me.

 

We will begin on Monday 17th February.

At the end of term 1 the school will review this. Please note there could be further changes due to unforeseen circumstances. We'll communicate this before changes are made.

 

Ngā mihi nui,

 

Mr G

 

 

 

27 Jan 2025

First game 14th February 2025

Info from organisers.

We have had a huge response and this means we will have 7 fields running at 3.30pm (U7 and U9) and then 3 fields (U11 and U13) 4.00pm - 5.30pm.

Please make sure we have a referee for the teams.

Games will be 13min halves with a min half time.

Duty teams will need to set up and pack away the cones for all of the fields.  The admin table with draws, scorecards, timer, horn etc will be set up on the bbq table (I will set this up for you).  Please make sure that all cards and balls have been given out before you start the round.  Please collect the gear in, at the end.  I will pack the gear up in the stadium.

There will also be a sausage sizzle running each week $3 sausage and $2 a drink.