Season 2, Episode 7 Building momentum: Creative strategies and partnerships for improving school attendance

We continue to talk about attendance in this episode, exploring proven strategies for boosting student attendance through meaningful partnerships. Hear how building strong relationships and addressing root causes—rather than just symptoms—can create lasting change in attendance patterns and student outcomes.

A note that attendance services mentioned in this episode were correct at the time of recording.

Hosted by Eleisha McNeill.

My guests are:

• Mandy Dodds, tumuaki of Kumara School on the West Coast
• Chris Bean, principal of Tangaroa College in Otara, Auckland
• James Christie, tumuaki of Mauku School in the Franklin district

This podcast was produced for the Ministry of Education.

 

You can learn more by accessing the e-learning modules for principals on the Education LMS: https://training.education.govt.nz

Episode Transcript

Eleisha (00:08):
Kia ora, and welcome to The Principals, a podcast series
for aspiring and current tumuakiin Aotearoa New Zealand. I'm
Eleisha McNeill. Today we'recontinuing to talk about
attendance and ways to addressit in your kura, and I'm joined
again by Chris Bean, tumuaki ofTangaroa College in O`tara,
Auckland, Mandy Dodds, principalof Kūmara School on the West

(00:31):
Coast of the South Island, andJames Christie, tumuaki of Mauku
School in the Franklin District.In the last episode, you all
talked about attendance services,so which support services or
external partnerships oragencies have been most um
valuable, when it comes toattendance, maybe start with you

(00:52):
Chris.

Chris (00:53):
We have EWIS, which is an engagement workers in schools,
that's our attendance agency, soonce again, that's a good
organisation to be associatedwith. So, that gives us an
immediate contact with for thosestruggle with to move over the
line. And so, it's reassuring tohave such people in place that
you can reach out to say, thisis the family, this is the

(01:13):
student, and what what we'llfind, especially from that
scenario, is that we may havethe older brother and sister
here, but the younger brotherand sister too, also goes to the
intermediate and goes to thelocal primary, so it captures
more than just the secondarystudent, it captures the whole
whānau if they're spread outacross those three different
settings. So it's a biggerpicture in that case around what

(01:34):
we need to do, so that's reallyworthwhile. We're lucky, too,
we've got social workers on site,we've got a guidance counsellor,
and all, all of them have alsotheir professional networks,

Eleisha (01:46):
Yeah.

Chris (01:47):
because we'll see a lot of those young people will bring
in very personal sensitivescenarios around them. And we
are good at teaching, and we aregood at trying to get our kids
to a position where they can besuccessful in an exam setting
and complete an assessment butwe're not the experts around
matters that are really personalto a young person, so having
those people on site are reallyhelpful because

Eleisha (02:07):
Yeah.

Chris (02:07):
like I said, they can tap into other agencies that can
provide immediate support andguidance around those things
which are very, very delicatefor those families and for that
young person.

Eleisha (02:18):
I imagine it's slightly different, um, where you are
Mandy?

Mandy (02:21):
I don't have a social worker on site. That would be
lovely, but we do as well as,you know, attendance services,
we do have a lot of socialservices that help out, not
necessarily at my school butagain as a full Kāhui Āko, we
do have things that the youngerprovision we've got Rock On

(02:43):
Poutini Waiora, Mana Ake, HomeBuilders, Te Hono, we've got
lots of social agencies that getinvolved with those really
chronic absent students andagain it's much the same as
Chris is saying it's often notjust at the primary school,
you'll find that it goes rightthrough and so those agencies
work with families which youknow, it's great, it's essential.

(03:06):
Yeah, it leaves us hopefully todo our core business.

Eleisha (03:10):
Yeah yeah. James?

James (03:12):
Similar again like the Kāhui Āko, for as long as it
lasts which is not much longerhas been useful because we will
take the connections that webuilt out of it, Chris said it
and he's right like that oftenif it's if a kid's absent from
our school and they've gotsiblings at the Intermediate or
High School it's a, there's apattern and so talking to each
other that's super important,and sometimes it's a sibling

(03:37):
from either our school or thehigh school that's absent but
the other, the brother or sisteris at school so it kind of helps
us to paint a story. We have aSWIS that comes in I think we
have one once a week and we havesupport with Kia Ora Ahi and
that's great for thoseunderlying issues or for you
know cos there's usuallysomething going on in the
background and so providingsomeone for those people to talk

(03:59):
to is

Eleisha (04:00):
Yeah .

James (04:00):
helpful. The RTLB that we have so that they they work with,
because they're behaviour andlearning they work with families
and sometimes attendance andbehaviour and learning kind of
sit there together so it'sanother way, and they meet with
whānau, they'll go and talk toparents, so it's another kind of
avenue into the home where theycan, they can go and they can be

(04:20):
the hey remember you have to beat school and they can put the
kind of, sometimes they can havethat firmer conversation, that's
one that we would like to havebut we don't want to come across
as, you know, like a powerfulkind of, I don't know I can't
think of the words, kind ofposition and break down the
relationship. They can have thatkind of harder conversation and
then we keep all ourrelationship all happy clappy
and we can carry on. Ourstrongest and the best people

(04:43):
for us is the FranklinAttendance Service so that's the
attendance team that that floataround our area, they're in and
out of houses, they come andcheck in with us probably once a
fortnight just how's it going,who's there, they'll come for a
walk around the classes, they'llmeet the kids, they'l present at
assembly so that everybody knowswho they are. One of the amazing

(05:04):
things they do in our area Ithink it's come from more
central Auckland and it'sworking our way out, they do,
they've helped to run some giveback days which are really
awesome they've run them atPukekohe Intermediate and
they're just a big day wherethey provide food, there's music,
they get a whole lot of localgrowers that will put food and
you can come and collect it,they'll have just just a whole

(05:25):
lot of free stuff that getspeople out of their house in the
local area they can go pick itup and then all of us schools
will kind of be there hangingaround and we get to shoulder
tap and have a conversation withpeople and and meet people that
way, and those kind of thingshelp to get people out of their
house, the get something for it,and it also builds those kind of
positive relationships, butoff-site because you know if

(05:48):
you've got to walk into theprincipal's office for a
conversation it's not usually anice one,

Eleisha (05:53):
Yeah.

James (05:53):
um, but if we can have that conversation with a cup of
tea between us, or some friedrice or something or while we're
both holding bags of potatoes,it's a bit more lowkey and, you
know, how's life going and allthat sort of stuff which
Franklin Attendance Serviceorganises is incredible for us,
without them, there'd be a biggap in what we were able to do

(06:14):
and who we'd we're able to getin contact with--

Eleisha (06:16):
Yeah, kai is a great unifier, eh

James (06:19):
mmh

Eleisha (06:19):
Um, So Chris, what do you think were the biggest
challenges that you have facedor are facing in being able to
improve attendance further inyour school?

Chris (06:31):
The biggest challenge is just to keep the momentum you
have and to, you have to youhave to constantly message out
the importance of being atschool. So that's a key for us.
So the challenge is just makingsure everyone's aware being at
school's important, it, it'scrucial. And we want your young
one at school. So it's justmaking sure that is is always
voiced in whatever way you can,so we try and use, uh,

(06:55):
newsletters to message it out.Try and use school prizegivings
to message it out. Try and useschool assemblies to message it
out. Try and use all ourdifferent media platforms to
message it out. Mandy and Jamesalluded to the Kāhui Āko. And
same

Eleisha (07:09):
Yeah.

Chris (07:09):
for us. We've got a great community of schools that we're
all part of this littlecollective and we too are all
working hard to face thischallenge and make a change
around this challenge. And so wewe hold community initiatives so
we have a big market night socommunities can come in and sell
things food is very popular ofcourse and then other items and

(07:30):
things like that. But we put abig stage on, there's
performances from the differentschools. And then we'll jump in
as the tumuakis and constantlyshare that message of the
importance about being at schooland all that, that goes with it.
So and then we came up with areally little creative motto,
which is attend today, achievetomorrow. And we share that
amongst ourselves cross all ourschools in that Kāhui Āko, so

(07:52):
it's once again, the samemessaging, the constant
messaging and I guess that's thechallenge is just keeping that
fresh and alive and, and theyknow that okay it's important
for my child to be at primaryschool and intermediate and now
it's important for my child tobe at college and just. What
you're trying to establish isjust normal routines and habits,
I guess,

Eleisha (08:11):
Yeah.

Chris (08:12):
that are fixed now into their their psyche and mindset
that it is becoming what youneed to do. So I guess that's
the challenge is putting that inplace so we can be reassured
that we get students turning upin high numbers. And the
challenge is trying to meet that80% attendance at 90% of you
know what it is across the boardthere.

(08:33):
It's just trying to work yourway towards that as best you can
and and put all the right thingsin place so you can move forward
with the young ones that youhave in front of you when they
do come to school.

Eleisha (08:43):
Mm. Definitely. Definitely. And those community
events, um, that you mentionedare a good way to connect with
the whānau who might not wantto set, um, foot in school too,
eh, you know, really, clever wayof getting everyone together.
Mandy, what do you find thebiggest challenge?

Mandy (09:01):
Because I think the biggest challenge is, like, is
moving forward and just tryingto keep the, not the pressure on,
that's the wrong word, buttrying to keep it all moving
forward and going together. Wehave done a lot of work as a
Kāhui, and after it's kind ofdisbanded, we've all decided
that we will hang together andstay meeting monthly, we've done

(09:23):
a lot of work on attendancebecause not so much for me
because I'm a little bit furtherout, but in Greymouth the
schools are all quite closetogether the primary

Eleisha (09:30):
Mm.

Mandy (09:31):
schools, and what they were finding is these kids would
jump from school to school toschool to school to avoid the
next step. So we've done a lotof work to ensure that all our
procedures are the same. Theyall say the same, we've done a
whole lot of work with theMinistry on the STAR, the
Stepped Attendance Response.

Eleisha (09:51):
Mm.

Mandy (09:52):
We all have the same info sitting behind our policy and
procedures. We all send out thesame letters, we're all saying
exactly the same thing - everyschool, it's doesn't matter
where you go in the Grey area,you're going to get the same
message about attendance. At theend of last year after school
had broken up, and we did onpurpose in the holidays,

Eleisha (10:13):
Mm.

Mandy (10:14):
we ran a competition to design a poster about attendance
to encourage people to come backschool in end of Jan, beginning
of February. The winner won aChrome Book and the poster went
up and we've got big electricbillboards on the main road, so
the poster was up there for thelast week of the holidays just

(10:35):
as a reminder of getting kidsback to school. The reason we
ran it in the holidays is wedidn't want kids necessarily
talking about it at school. Wewanted that conversation in the
dinner table, so you know whyshould we be at school? What
would be a good way to put thaton a poster? Let's design it
together. So that was reasonablysuccessful.

Eleisha (10:57):
That's very clever. (laughs)

Mandy (11:01):
So that was good, and obviously the child was
incredibly proud to have herposter up on the big billboard.
So that was just in the Greyarea. So we've been tasked with
taking that Coast-wide, so fromKaramea to Haast. So we'll run
something similar but it will belike I said trying to get
together just a short sloganthat everybody can use
Coast-wide that puts out thesame message. So again we'll do

(11:25):
that in the holidays so kids aretalking with parents, so they do
it together as a family andhoping to get that out on the
billboard. But also I had athought and I don't know how
we're going to go about it yetbut it's means talking to people
like Fulton Hogan and thingslike that. But they all have
those electric billboards. Andmaybe at the last week of every
school holidays can they putthem around the Coast and just a

(11:48):
quick message, "Hey rememberschool goes back on Monday."
Just so every time somebodydrives past it's in their face
again, you know? It's just yep,got to remember that. Just
little things like that, justkeeping it on top, bubbling away
on top for everybody.

Eleisha (12:00):
Yeah.

Mandy (12:01):
Not just us but for parents and kids but in more fun
ways.

Eleisha (12:06):
...Yeah, what cool creative ideas. Um, James, what
about you? What's the mostchallenging?

James (12:12):
I'd say that momentum thing

Eleisha (12:14):
Yeah.

James (12:14):
again, and then it is because, like I've been in
education, I don't know, since2007, I was a teacher, that's
when I started teaching, I'mpretty sure everybody agreed.
Like, children are differentthese days, and parents and
parenting is quite a lotdifferent these days.

Eleisha (12:29):
Oh,

James (12:29):
I'm not that old, but when I was like, when I tried to
be sick at home, when I was ayou had to be on death's door,
like

Eleisha (12:37):
Yeah.

James (12:37):
you lay in bed and you didn't move and you, here's
honey, here's lemon, all thatsort of stuff. Nowadays, and
everybody's tried it on, but thealternative back then was awful.
Now the alternative is well,okay, you can watch a bit of TV
and, okay, go on, whateverdevice it is for a bit. So
there's also, we're competingwith that. There's a reason not

(12:59):
be at school because that's whatparenting looks like now. And,
you know, I know there's somefamilies that don't have devices,
and that's awesome, but lots offamilies they do. And if parents
are working at home and they'retrying to have a meeting, and
they have to keep Johnny quiet,well, there's, they go to those
options. That's that's kindthat's a struggle. I do think
most parents just want the bestfor their children. And I think

(13:21):
for the most part, the childrendo want to be at school. They
want to be among their friends,

Eleisha (13:26):
Yeah

James (13:26):
they, they do want to learn. But we have to make sure
that education, the value ineducation is put there, that
parents have reasons to sendtheir children to school and
want to send their children toschool. And we make sure we're
talking to parents, they knowthat they can send their kids,
we're going to look after them.They're going to have a great
day, we're going to support themif they don't have food, we'll
give them that, you know, it,yeah, it's just times are

(13:50):
changing. And I don't think likeit's, we're not at kind of the,
I don't know if it's an up or adown or a what, but we're, it's
going to keep evolving. And wedon't, you know, 20 years ago,
we didn't know what it wouldlook like now. Who knows what's
going to look like in another 20years.

Eleisha (14:04):
You're exactly right, it quite scary eh, looking
forward. Um, what advice wouldyou all, you know, having done a
great job with attendance inyour kura, what advice would you
give to, to other principals whoare struggling with attendance
issues? What do you think theyshould start by focusing on,
Chris?

Chris (14:25):
Well, firstly, I don't have the secret recipe to how
this could be achieved, you'vejust got to work hard. It's it's
clear you've got to understandwhat your particular issue or
issues are, because everythingis specific to your own
community, your own area, andit's then just trying to then
work on what those particularconcerns that you are faced with

(14:49):
but try and work on a few ofthem, or just one or two at the
most.

Eleisha (14:54):
Mm.

Chris (14:55):
Don't try and hit every marker straight away. Work on
what's going to get you a shiftand a change early. It's going
to either get people through thefront gate into the classroom
space or it starts to get theconversation going. Also
important to make sure you sharethat responsibility across your
team, your SLT team. So I'mlucky I've got a SLT member that

(15:19):
their portfolio is attendance.And then like I said you've got
deans and then you've got yourWā teachers or your form
teachers who take on thatresponsibility. And then it's
buy-in from all, so um sharethat responsibility. And then
you also want to make sure yourstudents want to be at your
school, feel comfortable beingat school, like being at your
school. And that's obviouslyputting in place things that

(15:41):
they like to do and what drivesthem to be here. And I guess too
also speak to other principals.We've got a wonderful community
amongst all the differentprincipals who don't hold all
their cards to their chest andnot share. We all actually have
the same problem in front of us,so reach out to people you trust,
out up to people you know aresuccessful in this space and

(16:02):
just ask for those little goldennuggets which they may have
which gives you some sense of,oh, I must try that or I haven't
thought about that becausethat's a good way to sort of
move in a direction to makethose small changes like I said
and then once they start pilingup on top of each other and
you've realised you've you'veticked off a lot of those
concerns that may sit around you.But as I said at the start I

(16:24):
didn't have the secret recipeand it's still a struggle now.

Eleisha (16:27):
Yeah

Chris (16:27):
And we've got things in place to try and make it a shift
and a change and it is term byterm and it's week by week and
day by day. And it's just amatter of like I said trying to
make it a as normal as possiblea positive habit which grows
through our primary and thenintermediate and then hopefully
falls into our space so Jamesand Mandy have got the tough
task, put that in place and thenwe hopefully reap the rewards

Eleisha (16:51):
Awesome, Mandy, what would your advice

Mandy (16:54):
I think to begin with, start with the things that you
can control and work out fromthat. For me data is really
important, like having it inblack and white and being able
to see it is very different towhat you perceive may be the
issue because sometimes they'renot the same thing. And find,

(17:15):
dig to find the stories behindthe attendance or lack of
attendance because I think onceyou know the why and the how and
build the relationships,sometimes the answer is there.
And the same with Chris, we havea really good community of

(17:35):
principals that we'll gettogether, we all talk, none of
us are, you know, too scared topick up the phone and ask
somebody else or talk tosomebody else about the same
kind of issues. We all here,we're all sitting behind the
same desk having the same issueso talk it over with somebody
that you think might have theanswer. But there is no, no

(17:58):
golden bullet, there is justnothing, it's not. Everybody's
different and every story isdifferent and so every answer
will be different, yeah, andit's not always the big things
that work, you know, that'ssometimes it's the little things.

Eleisha (18:13):
Yep. James, what would your advice be

James (18:17):
Yeah, I think it's got to be around having the culture in
your school so that's havingeverybody on board, making sure
there's reasons, all that sortof stuff. That, that kind of
thing is what's going to geteverybody there, but that's not
an easy thing to come up with,and it's going to be specific to
different types of schools anddifferent areas with different

(18:37):
kind of things going on. Andit's just one of those things
where you just, you might nothave all the answers in front of
you, and it's, you don't have tocome up with them straight away.
There are other people that youcan go and talk to that are
doing the same job with, youknow, there's schools down the
road doing the same thing we are.So, so talking. I remember there

(18:58):
was a thing when I was, oh yearsago, it was a behaviour course
that I went on and they went onabout knowing thy learner, which
is really important. You've gotto know thy learner, but it's
actually, I think it's whatyou've got to know thy whānau.

Eleisha (19:10):
Yeah.

James (19:10):
Like if you don't know the story and the people that
come with the child to yourschool, you can't teach them,
you can't set up the environment,and you can't create your
culture for them. You need toknow about what's going on at
home for them, who's at home, wthey like, what they don't like,
what other issues are going onand be able to support those

(19:32):
things through your school. Sothat's that relationship thing
and I think that's a key role ofa principal is to like there's
lots of management and paperwork,but getting out, being seen and
making sure that people knowthat this, schools are a great
place to be, this is where youneed to be. We want, we want

(19:52):
your children at our kura and wewant to do everything we can, we...
Teaching is a vocation, we'repaid, okay. Quite well most of
the time and we spend lots oftime in non-contact time, but
pretty much every single teacherloves their job more than the
amount of money they paid,

Eleisha (20:11):
Yeah.

James (20:11):
so they turn up to make a difference. And we just want
your children to be in the doors,so we can do that. That's what
we're, you can tell a teacherwalking in a street. Some of
these people are born into thisjob and it's all they want to do.

Eleisha (20:24):
Yeah, so what I've heard today is that attendance
is, you know, you got to beflexible, you've got to be
creative, and you've got to bewilling to work with the kids in
the funnel to make work, fo themand for the school, you know, to
make sure that though the kidsget the best outcomes they can.
Yeah, so thank you very much,some really great advice there.

James (20:47):
Awesome thank you it was a pleasure. It's nice to meet
you guys. I've got lots of ideasas well. I like your slogan
Chris.

Mandy (20:54):
Yep. Thank

Eleisha (20:55):
Ha

Mandy (20:55):
you all it was great.

Chris (20:57):
Cheers, Eleisha. Ka kite.

Eleisha (20:58):
That was awesome. Thanks, guys. Just a quick note
that all of those attendanceservices were correct at the
time of recording. And the nextepisode, we're going to be
talking about the first hundreddays of principalship. Mā te
wā.