School gets caned for trips

By BRIDGET CARTER

A tiny school in the Hokianga has been told it may be spending too much time and money on trips skiing and visiting Auckland.

Last year, Omanaia School students spent more than three weeks out of the classroom on excursions, including one to Ohakune at a cost of $9480.

Principal Dave Clark said the trips were important because they gave the school's disadvantaged primary school students a chance to learn about the world outside Omanaia.

But the Education Review Office said it was difficult to see how the trips were linked to the national school curriculum.

Board members needed to review the time spent on the out-of-town visits.

The comments come from an ERO report just released, which said Omanaia School was facing a number of problems and needed help from the Ministry of Education.

It said the school trips involved a lot of time and effort from the school's community to raise thousands of dollars.

For the Ohakune trip last year, local families raised $3400.

More attention should be focused on classroom planning, student assessment and following procedure with things like board meetings and student stand downs.

Staff needed to provide written evidence that the students were receiving a quality education, the report said.

Mr Clark said he accepted that Omanaia School had a history of critical ERO reports and had areas that needed to improve.

But he said the trips were important for his 23 primary school students.

The school was situated south of the Hokianga Harbour in one of New Zealand's most deprived areas.

Most families could not afford to take their children skiing at Ohakune, to Aroha Island, north east of Kerikeri, climbing Rangitoto Island or to Auckland where they would see a live show and stay at a marae.

He wanted them to have the same opportunities as students who attended schools in affluent areas.

"Their whole world is Omanaia School and they don't really have a broad view of the world," he said.

"If you can provide your children with a trip around the world every once and a while they are going to be far better off than those who don't.

"They have a lot more to talk about, a lot more experiences."

Whangarei Ministry of Education manager Chris Eve said ministry representatives would meet the Omanaia school board within the next few weeks to decide what sort of help the school needed.

He said it was up to each school how much time their students spent outside the classroom.

Most schools took a class away for a five-day outdoor education experience.

"It wouldn't be that difficult to get to three weeks."

Mr Clark said students wrote about their trips before and after they occurred, but he would try to make the trips more closely related to the national curriculum.

"I suppose that is fair cop. It is something we hadn't done."