How can we get our children back to school?

Students are more motivated to attend school when they are less tired and stressed, have positive relationships with their friends and teachers, and learn things that align with their aspirations.

These are the key findings of a report looking at the barriers and incentives to school attendance from researchers at Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland.

Turning up at school is a major factor in student achievement but young people in New Zealand are attending less now than in the past decade.

And although absenteeism is a worldwide issue, attendance rates in Aotearoa appear to have had a steeper decline over the past ten years compared with Australia and the UK, says Dr Georgia Rudd, one of the report’s authors.

A research fellow in social and community health from the Faculty of Arts and Education, Dr Rudd says preventing absenteeism is a complex issue, so including those most affected – the students themselves – in the conversation is invaluable.

“Our findings highlight that the roughly 1000 young people (aged 13) who responded to our questions about school, as well as other areas of their lives for our wider project, are motivated or put off attending for different reasons from what their parents, educators and policymakers might assume, for example.”

As well as harder factors to influence like individual and family circumstances, findings suggest efforts to improve school attendance should focus on internal factors within the education system itself, says Dr Rudd.
 

“The relevance of the curriculum to the requirements of adult life and future careers, how the day is structured to reflect that, and fostering school environments that help young people build meaningful connections with each other, their teachers, and their learning will all have an impact on attendance.”

She says they found most young people felt positive about school, valued learning and recognised its importance.

“This was significant given these respondents were about to, or had just transitioned, to high school, which can be both a time of challenge and opportunity.”

Respondents felt an obligation to attend school, but not just because of the legal requirement, says Rudd.

“This sense of obligation was often discussed in relation to making parents proud and fulfilling their expectations of the young person.”

Respondents also noted that school was not working for everyone, with one saying the current system was “outdated, rigid and overly focused on conformity”.

The report is part of Our Voices, a wider project aimed at better understanding what young people in in Aotearoa need to thrive to inform policies and services aimed at supporting their wellbeing.

Tō Mātou Rerenga - Our Journey and Growing Up in New Zealand

Data was collected within Tō Mātou Rerenga - Our Journey, an app co-designed by University of Auckland researchers, alongside young people from the Growing Up in New Zealand longitudinal study (GUiNZ), New Zealand's largest, ongoing cohort study.

The report School Attendance, Enablers & Barriers, by Simpson, S., Williamson, I., Rudd, G., Peterson, E. R., Walker, C., Marks, E., & Meissel, K. (2025) uses information from around 1,000 13-year-olds who are part of GUiNZ.

GUiNZ recruited and now follows 6,846 New Zealand children born between 2009 and 2010, with the aim of creating an in-depth summary of what life is like for them and what factors affect their happiness, health and development.

Subsequent Our Voices reports, using data in the Tō Mātou Rerenga - Our Journey app, will focus on school experiences, overcoming challenges, social connections, navigating rough waters and the school environment.

The project was funded by the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment and involves a multidisciplinary team of national and international experts.

Visit the Our Voices website for the full report.