Media Release

Boys’ success targeted in new report

A new report on boys’ educational achievement shows the areas most in need of improvement for boys are reading and writing and staying at school.

The report Boys’ Achievement: a Synthesis of the Data says achievement for boys has held up over the past five years, but still lags behind girls in some areas.

The key findings were:

• From year 11 boys are leaving school at a faster rate than girls.
• There is no difference in the rate of truancy for boys and girls, but significantly more boys, are suspended, excluded or expelled and boys gain more early leaving exemptions.
• At 6 years old boys are twice as likely as girls to be entered into Reading Recovery.
• There are no systematic gender differences in mathematics and science achievement.
• There is evidence that the reading gender gap reduces over time but increases for writing.
• Girls tend to stay at school longer and leave school with higher attainment levels than boys.
• Boys are more likely than girls to leave school with little or no formal qualification but this difference has decreased over recent years.

Ministry of Education schooling policy group manager Kim Shannon said the report will be used to identify areas where assistance needs to be targeted.

“The ministry has a lot of work underway transforming the school experience for young people – particularly those who have traditionally not remained engaged right through to the end of secondary school.

“This report will feed into work on Schools Plus and Youth Apprenticeships, which will give greater flexibility of pathways to senior students, and Ka Hikitia, the Maori Strategy, which aims to improve Maori learners’ experience in the education system.”

Kim Shannon said there are a number of initiatives already in New Zealand schools which are having a positive impact on boys’ success.

“The Literacy Professional Development Programme and over professional development such as Te Kotahitanga is having a marked impact on improving the achievement of the lowest-performing boys.

“As well, by continually improving the resources available to schools to reduce suspensions expulsions, and exclusions, and by replacing high rates of early leaving exemption with better-tailored school programmes, schools are getting better at keeping boys in class and rapidly improving their chances of succeeding in education.”

For more information:

Iain Butler
Senior Media Advisor
Ministry of Education
Phone: 04 463 8017
Mobile: 027 283 6122

The full report is available at: http://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/24889.

For more information on Schools Plus and Ka Hikitia - Managing for Success, visit: www.schoolsplus.govt.nz or kahikitia.minedu.govt.nz