Tena koutou katoa. Nga mihi atawhai nui.

What a very different week. After Minister Hipkins’ announcement last Wednesday that all schools will be open for learning for Year 11-13, there has been a flurry of announcements, guidelines and clarifications about what this means and how it is to be carried out, meeting all the required Alert L3 H&S measures.

The confusion has been considerable. At first, it was seen that all schools were required to open and then it was clarified over Labour Weekend that it was optional, and opening was only intended for those students doing practical subjects that were unable to work online.

But, as we have always done, we have put the wellbeing and health of our students and our whānau first and foremost, and re-planned accordingly. Those who needed to come onsite to catch up with their teacher, face to face, could opt to do that for an extended learning session and then, return to online learning. Our staff are not able to do online and onsite learning simultaneously – what happens is that neither is done particularly well and it adds to the already considerable teaching stress, especially for those teaching senior students.

What is important for these NCEA students to know is that we are currently reviewing all of the latest NZQA updates and will be sending out a summary of what students need to know with regards to their Unexpected Events Grades and their external examinations shortly.

We continue to review information as it comes to hand and will keep you all up to date.