School Rolls

The Ministry of Education carries out statistical collections (roll returns) from New Zealand schools at different times during the year.

The data reported here is based on the 1 July roll returns since it provides detailed information on age and ethnicity for trend analysis.

Introduction

School roll information is core information required for managing the education system.  The Ministry uses roll return data:

  • to fund and staff schools
  • to support policy analysis
  • to monitor the results of the New Zealand education system
  • for national and international reporting

More information about school roll returns can be found on the School Rolls Data Collection page.

The key measure of roll returns is a head count of students; and is the data presented on this page.

Roll returns also include information on:

School numbers are also presented with student rolls used to show the size of the school.

Interactive Dashboard

The buttons at the top of the dashboard control what is on the bottom axis of the graph.  The “Colour By:” buttons to the right of the graph change the bar’s colours to allow a second group to be shown.  To filter the data use any of the Region, School or Student filters on the left.  To switch between the filters use the buttons titled "Region", "School" and "Student".  By default the dashboard only shows data from the most recent year.  To select other years use the dropdown in the top left (under “Filters”).

You can expand the dashboard by pressing the ⤢ icon in the bottom right corner of the dashboard.

Read the instructions (pdf 77kB) for more guidance on using the July School Roll Return dashboard.

Time Series Data

These spreadsheets provide numbers of students for a range of dimensions (such as region, school authority, and ethnicity) across time in a simple, easy to use format.

Pivot Tables

These spreadsheets allow you to create your tables by any combination of variables.  All spreadsheets have the option of displaying number of students by school, school type variables (such as decile or affiliation), and regional type variables.

Please note: use of this spreadsheet requires MS Excel version 2007 or later.


Pivot Tables with Total Response Ethnicity

Please note: Total Response Ethnicity is where students are counted once in each ethnic group they identify with. E.g. If a student identifies as Māori and Asian then they’ll be counted in both the Māori and Asian student count.

Total Response is the preferred way to report ethnicity. Because methods of collecting and processing ethnicity data have improved over time, total response ethnicity is provided here as far back as the ‘total ethnicity’ data is fully accurate; earlier data is available only as ‘prioritised ethnicity’. For more details about the Ministry’s ethnicity data, see here: Ethnic Group Codes


Pivot Tables with Prioritised Ethnicity

Please note: Prioritised Ethnicity is where students that identify with more than one ethnicity are only counted in one ethnicity. They are prioritised in the order of Māori, Pacific, Asian, other groups except European/Pākehā.

Machine Readable Data

The following data are provided in a format (csv) that can easily processed by a computer.  It contains the same data that is in the school rolls pivot tables.

Technical Notes

Schools can and do make amendments to their roll data outside of a collection period if they notice mistakes that affect their funding entitlements, often brought about by audit visits.  These changes will not be reflected in the roll data that has been published.

School Data Dimension Notes

Age:
The age (in years) as at 1 July of the student enrolled at the school.

Affiliation:
This dimension is most commonly represented for state integrated schools. The religious or organisational affiliation of schools, for example, Roman Catholic, Montessori. Only schools that requested an affiliation are included in that affiliation group.

Authority:
The ownership of the school for example State, State-Integrated and Private.

Decile:
The decile assigned to the school. Students from low socio-economic communities face more barriers to learning than students from high socio-economic communities. Schools that draw their roll from these low socio-economic communities are given greater funding to combat these barriers. The mechanism used to calculate and allocate this additional funding is most often known as school deciles.

Schools are assigned a socio-economic score based on five census derived socio-economic factors. The 10 percent of schools with the lowest scores are considered decile 1 schools, the next 10 percent of schools are considered decile 2 schools, etc. Decile 1 schools have the highest proportion of low SES students.

Education Region:
The education region the school of the student is located in. These are ten administrative regions created by the Ministry of Education and aligned with the Ministry's ten local offices.

Ethnic Group (Prioritised):
The ethnic group the member belongs to, for example, Māori, Asian. The ethnic group data is presented at level 1 and prioritised in the order of Māori, Pasifika, Asian, other groups except European/Pākehā. Prior to 2009, NZAID (MFAT) and FFP students had a combined separate ethnic group. NZAID (MFAT) students are now considered to be domestic and are part of the regular ethnic group counts. International Fee-Paying are a separate ethnic group.

Ethnic Group (Total Response):
The ethnic group the student belongs to, for example, Māori, Asian. The ethnic group data is presented at level 1 and total response. That means students are counted in each level 1 ethnic group they have indicated they belong to. While a student may be represented in more than one ethnic group, they are only counted once in the ethnic group "Total".

Funding Year Level:
Prior to 2008 this was known as Year of Schooling or MOE Year Level. The Funding Year Level measures the number of years of schooling a student has received and provides the Ministry of Education with a method of counting students for funding and staffing purposes. The Funding Year Level for most students is based on the date they first started school. It is independent of the way schools are organised and independent of the particular programme of study that a student may undertake.

Regional Council:
The regional council area the school of the student is located in. Regional council boundaries are defined by Statistics New Zealand.

School Gender:
The gender of the students that a school caters for, for example, co-educational, boys school.  A small number of single sex schools can have some students of the opposite sex on their roll. These students can only access the education they need at these 'opposite sex' schools i.e. adults or special needs students.

School Type:
The type of the school, for example, primary school, composite school, secondary school.

Sector:
Schools are grouped (by school type) into four sectors of schooling education, Primary, Secondary, Composite and Specialist.

Student Gender:
The gender of the students.

Student Type:

Regular Student:
A domestic student, who is aged less than 19 years at 1 January of the roll count year. Includes; students in general classrooms and those in special needs units. Excludes; international fee-paying students, NZAID-funded students (prior to 2009), alternative education students and adult students. This classification is used by the Ministry for funding purposes.

IFP:
An international student (prior to 2009 these were Foreign Fee Paying students) who meets the full tuition costs on their own or from funds provided to them by sponsors other than the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

NZAID Funded Student:
New Zealand Agency for International Development funded student. A student on a scholarship from the New Zealand Agency for International Development. Prior to 2004 this was known as a MFAT scholarship. As of 2009 these students are now part of the domestic count and not included in international fee paying student totals.

Alternative Education Student:
A young person aged between thirteen and a half and sixteen years of age who has become alienated from the education system. As they are either unwilling to attend a regular school or schools are unwilling to enrol them in a mainstream setting they attend an Alternative Education Programme.

Adult Student:
A domestic student who has continued at a school and is aged 19 years or over on 1 January of the roll count year.

Territorial Authority:
The territorial authority area the school of the student is located in. Territorial authority boundaries are defined by Statistics New Zealand. We have subdivided the Auckland Supercity territorial authority into smaller wards to give more detailed information of the area.

Other Roll Information

Homeschooling information, that is, the number of students that are homeschooled, is also available.

ENROL is a register of student enrolments.  It lets schools update enrolments as students enrol, change schools or leave the school system.  ENROL is another source of roll information.