Dawn visits flush out cheats

Avondale College principal Brent Lewis says his staff check up on zone cheats. Picture / Jeff Brass

Schools are being forced to carry out early morning doorknocks to flush out zone cheats as parents use increasingly desperate tactics to beat the system and get their children in the best schools.

Principals say they are increasingly being forced to "play God" with little guidance from the Ministry of Education on school zoning rules.

Many principals spoken to by the Herald on Sunday said they had resorted to knocking on students' doors to check they hadn't enrolled under a false address.

Brent Lewis, principal of Avondale College, said his staff doorknocked between 7am and 8am.

"We do get quite a number of fallacious addresses and we do have to do early morning visits at times, to ensure that people are where they say they are."

Lewis said he had between 300 and 400 students waiting for a place at Avondale, and, after document checks and phone calls, doorknocking was an accepted way to check up on cheats.

Students could be refused enrolment if the address proved false.

"They are taking up places that would otherwise be taken up by those at the top of a waiting list, and people who are following due processes."

Staff had used the doorknock tactic five or six times in the past year, and about 20 times in total. "You can guarantee that a school like ours - any school of choice - has this problem."

Annette Sharp, principal of Epsom Girls Grammar School (EGGS), said her enrolment manager had visited homes "earlier in the day" two or three times this year.

At most schools, parents had to produce a power and phone bill and a statutory declaration as proof they lived in the qualifying zone.

At EGGS, if the school was still "unclear", the enrolment manager would arrange a visit.

"You could say that was doorknocking; I'm not sure that it's extreme."

Brian Rivers, deputy principal of Westlake Boys' High School, confirmed he had also visited homes to check up on students.

He said: "I've done it later in the day, very rarely. In the afternoon - especially if I suspect that they've given a business address, and said that there's accommodation there."

Roger Moses, principal of Wellington College, said his staff often visited students' houses, especially when they first enrolled. "We haven't actually had the dawn raids - but we will turn up and check it out."

Cases ranged from students living with extended, in-zone family - which Moses said was normal for Maori or Polynesian cultures - to students who were over 16 and therefore could legally live in the zone, away from their parents.

"One case yesterday, a kid had got in-zone through a ballot. The parents' marriage has broken up, the father has gone to live with the mother of another boy and now they're claiming a stepbrother connection on that basis.

"What can we do? We're sort of called upon to play God.

"People are doing all they possibly can to get into the school - a significant number are, at the very least, stretching the law."

David Hodges, principal of Rangitoto College, said his school had a 300-strong waiting list but "we don't resort to doorknocking at houses in the morning".

Hodges said although his school was the largest in the country, staff knew the zone "better than any taxi driver" and the stable community made it difficult for parents to give false addresses.

Rob Kirkpatrick, board manager of Auckland Grammar, said the school had "experimented" with doorknocking in recent years.

"It's not particularly effective - and it can be pretty expensive."

He said it would be "impolite" to comment further on zoning or enrolment issues because the school was in talks with the Ministry of Education.

The ministry recently upheld 20 out of 45 appeals from Auckland Grammar boys that the school had kicked out for breaking zoning rules.

Principal John Morris has challenged that decision.