With the Government trying to crack down on truancy, New Zealand kids have their say on why they are skipping school. Video / Alyse Wright
Before the Covid pandemic, an increasingly higher proportion of state secondary school students were leaving school with NCEA Level 3.
That trend is now in reverse post-Covid, with achievement levels dropping to where they were a decade ago. Less than half of those leaving a state school in 2023 had NCEA Level 3.
Experts speculate that a combination of factors could be contributing, including the lingering consequences of disruption from the Covid pandemic.
After new NCEA standards came out in 2013, only 45% of students leaving a state school had NCEA Level 3. This roseto 50% in 2016, 51% in 2019 and 57% in the first year of the pandemic, when Covid disruption enabled students to receive bonus credits.
But it’s been all downhill since then, and across the board.
The proportion falling short of NCEA Level 3 dipped below 50% again in 2022 (48.7%), and even further in 2023 (47.5%), leaving the achievement rate where it was about a decade ago. The achievement rate for University Entrance fell to a new low (32.8%) for state school leavers in 2023, the lowest in more than a decade.
Steeper post-pandemic drops occurred for NCEA Levels 1 and 2 achievement, which had both been on the rise leading into the pandemic, though not as consistently as for NCEA Level 3.
And while the 2023 Level 3 achievement rates for students leaving integrated schools (70.9%) and private schools (84.1%) were much higher than their state school counterparts, these were both below their pre-pandemic heights (75.5% for integrated school leavers, and 87.8% for private school leavers).
A major factor is the number of students dropping out before their 17th birthday, without NCEA Level 3 or University Entrance. In 2023 there were more than 12,000 such students, or 27% of all those leaving a state school.
“My best guess is that what we’re seeing is the long-term impacts of the Covid disruption,” said Dr Nina Hood, academic director at The Teachers‘ Institute, and co-founder of the Education Hub.
“We know mainly anecdotally from schools that children are coming through into secondary school with some of that foundational learning missing. They haven’t necessarily developed the full range of knowledge and skills as a result of the Covid disruption, which is in turn impacting their achievement once they get into Year 13.”
“Covid amplified long-term persistent education gaps across a range of OECD countries including the UK,” says a 2024 academic paper A Generation At Risk, which estimated up to six months of “learning loss”, and up to eight months for students with higher socio-economic barriers.
Another 2024 report - The State of the American Student- estimated the average student in the US is “less than halfway to a full academic recovery” from the effects of the pandemic.
Hood said it’s understandable that the impact of the pandemic is still lingering. Students in Year 9 when the virus arrived on these shores were in Year 13 last year.
Education Hub co-founder and The Teachers' Institute academic director Dr Nina Hood. Photo / Supplied
“Some of them missed out on a lot of teaching time, and as a result, they will have missed out on some key learning. And that has a follow-through impact year on year,” she told the Herald.
“The other point I‘ve heard from some schools is, post-pandemic, there have been among some children decreases in their motivation.”
Post Primary Teachers Association president Chris Abercrombie echoed this point: “There seems to be less desire to go to university, evidenced by a decrease in university enrolment numbers over the last couple of years, so more students are not completing UE requirements.”
Contributing factors
School leaver data is considered a more accurate picture of educational achievement than NCEA results because it includes all students, including those who dropped out before getting a chance to sit some levels of NCEA.
Educational achievement correlates to socio-economic barriers, a pattern that is nothing new, though the gap between rich and poor widened in 2023. Of all the Māori students who dropped out in 2023 before they turned 17, 96% faced a range of social-economic barriers according to the Ministry of Education’s Equity Index score, which replaced the decile system.
The 2023 data also offers a first glimpse at a post-Covid trend, and this shows significant decreases in educational achievement compared to pre-pandemic trends.
As with UE, the achievement rates for those leaving a state school with at least NCEA Level 1 (81.9%) and Level 2 (71.6%) were the lowest since the new NCEA standards in 2013.
NZQA deputy chief executive Jann Marshall said Covid was especially disruptive for certain cohorts of students, “particularly for Year 12 students attempting NCEA Level 2″.
“In NCEA Levels 1 and 2, these declines also partially relate to decreasing participation by Year 11 students in a full Level 1 assessment programme, and by Year 12 students in a full Level 2 assessment programme. However, this has been less of a factor for Year 13 students at Level 3, where participation has remained relatively steady.”
The number of students leaving state schools before their 17th birthday jumped 44% in 2023, compared to the pre-pandemic average. If you were a 16-year-old Maori student in a state school in 2023, there was essentially a 50/50 chance you’d drop out. For 16-year-old Pacific students, three in 10 dropped out in 2023.
The 2023/24 Health Survey found 27% of children (55% for Pacific children and 34% for Māori children) lived in households where food ran out “often or sometimes”, a significant increase on the 21.3% from the previous year.
The number of young people in moderate to high distress has nearly doubled since 2016/17, according to the 2022/23 Health Survey, and while a quarter of those aged 15-24 have high mental health needs, the percentage who can’t access support when they need it has risen by 77%.
Johnston said that poor school attendance was also a likely factor, though he noted that attendance improved between 2022 and 2023, when student achievement went in the opposite direction. The regular attendance rate (more than 90% of the term) for term 2 in 2021 was 59.7%, dropping to 39.8% in 2022 before lifting to 47.1% in 2023.
“And there’s been a general shortage of teachers, especially specialist teachers in maths and science. Certainly last year schools were also really struggling to get relievers,” Johnston said.
The Covid pandemic resulted in a lot of online teaching and time outside the classroom.
Where to from here?
In early 2021, education professors Stephen Dobson and Donna Prendergast warned that the pandemic could leave teenagers in a state of uncertainty at a stage when their brains are being rewired for adulthood. This risked “lifelong reduced outcomes such as poorer health, lowered educational achievement and the loss of optimism and hope”.
Now Dean of Education and the Arts at Central Queensland University, Dobson told the Herald there was a risk of a lost generation who were at school during the pandemic.
“There’s a threat that the coming generation of graduates from high school - some call it Generation A, or the Fragile Generation - will have permanently changed the way they engage with knowledge,” he told the Herald.
“They’re not willing to commit to a three-year bachelor or a long apprenticeship. They want to select their knowledge in smaller pieces, and to get it quickly. I think the pandemic has brought this to life, accelerating a process that was already happening.”
Pandemic-related learning loss and decreasing motivation were only one part of the story, he said.
“All the research on the brain shows that they will be affected long-term. The kids who are coming through NCEA are marked by the [Covid] time when they didn’t have to engage as much with their studies. That generation is still coming through.”
But Hobson said there should be more emphasis on social learning and student behaviour.
“Understanding you have to attend your classes, and to attend prepared. You have to do your homework. We spend so much time with this curriculum content, but that’s not what it’s about,” he said.
“It’s about getting kids to be engaged and to understand the importance of knowledge, and that happens when they learn socially. That’s when they understand that the knowledge they gain will impact them when they go into the workforce.”
Hood said there needed to be a fresh look at education “holistically”.
“We need to make sure the quality of the teaching and learning is as high as it can be. We need to make sure that we are identifying and addressing gaps within children’s learning,” she said.
“But I think we also need to look at all the other factors that contribute to children’s achievement in schools, such as young people’s mental health. I don’t think one thing is going to fix it.”
Derek Cheng is a senior journalist who started at the Herald in 2004. He has worked several stints in the press gallery team and is a former deputy political editor.
Chris Knox is the Data Editor and Head of Data Journalism for the Herald.
