Little school victim of rural brain-drain

By KEVIN TAYLOR

Tiny Waihou School is a victim of the times.

The 120-year-old rural school near Te Aroha held its last lessons yesterday, and principal Ian Duncan said goodbye to the job he has held for 12 years.

The 31 pupils will go to other schools next year, including nearby Elstow School, which will be renamed Elstow-Waihou.

School closures and mergers are happening all over Waikato's Matamata-Piako district, a symptom of declining rural populations.

The district's population is expected to fall 12.9 per cent between 1996 and 2021. Other rural districts are experiencing similar declines.

Waihou School was the first in the Matamata-Piako district and when Mr Duncan arrived in 1988 it had 125 pupils and five teachers. By the time it closed yesterday the staff numbered two.

Mr Duncan says farm mergers and a decline in work opportunities have brought a steady drop in the number of families in rural districts, and that has been reflected in school rolls. "It's sad, but it's a symptom of the times."

Other schools in the district are also struggling.

"There are just no children around," he says.

Pupil numbers in rural schools in the Te Aroha area alone have halved from about 600 five years ago.

Further south near Matamata, Wardville and Turanga-o-moana schools will merge on the Wardville site.

This month, the Affco meat company released a survey showing two-thirds of farmers believed it was unlikely their children would spend more than half their working lives in the rural sector.

Only about a third thought their children would work most of their lives on the land.

Affco chief executive Ross Townshend says the issue has become a big problem for the farming industry. The sector is fighting a perception problem and may be facing a rural brain-drain.

"Not only are farmers having trouble attracting enough skilled workers, they are also facing the challenge of securing their own offspring's interest in the industry," says Mr Townshend.

Waihou township now has just one shop. Four others are empty.

On Wednesday, the Government unveiled its Heartland initiative to improve delivery of services to rural areas.

Social Services and Employment Minister Steve Maharey and Rural Affairs Minister Jim Sutton say the initiative aims to improve face-to-face contact with Government agencies.

Departments will synchronise visits to remote towns once or twice a month as part of an outreach service, and set up service centres in some smaller towns.

The ministers say direct contact with Government agencies is often available only in larger centres.

They claim the initiative will help to bring the heart back into rural communities, but it may be a losing battle.

There is no room for Mr Duncan, aged 59, at the merged school and he is taking early retirement. He is not bitter, but is sorry to leave behind an old school with beautiful grounds.

The merger with Elstow, 7km up the road, will create a 140-pupil school.

"That's a good thing. It might even draw people from other schools," Mr Duncan says.

"All through we could have held on, but it would have been the wrong thing to do. There are five schools within 7km of us."

The Ministry of Education has yet to decide the fate of the two school buildings.