Dannevirke's Community of Learning is a positive forum, Jo Brown, of Tararua REAP, says.
"It's about professional development and working on smoother transitions for early childhood children into primary schools and ultimately high school and about shared understandings and practices," she told the Dannevirke News.
Jo, a passionate educator, said the first five years was all about building a brain. Stephen Snell, Dannevirke South School principal and lead principal for the Dannevirke CoL, emphasised the importance of incorporating early childhood centres in the group.
"We're unique in that we're the first to fully involve early childhood centres," he said.
Mr Snell said the emphasis of the CoL is on the children.
"I was a pretty good kid at school, but I never knew where I was heading and it took a few years of mucking around after school, before I knew which direction I was heading," he said.
"The CoL is about trying to give our students a pathway to the future, with a marvellous progression from early childhood education, to primary school and through to high school and careers.
"We want to give kids an idea of what's possible. In Dannevirke we have experts and top educators who are future focused on improving learning for our kids."