General Information

Absences: If your child is absent from school you must contact the school as soon as possible - see below for how. If your child is sick keep them away until they are fully recovered so bugs don’t spread - just keep us informed.

After School Care: After School Care (ASC) is available for all confirmed children every day between 2.30 and 5.30pm. It can be found in the Te Raakau learning space. Contact the ASC manager, Warren Wood, if you are interested in using this service: warrenw@whatawhata.school.nz or call 

Bus: There are two school buses that provide transport to and from school. If you are over 3.2km from school, you are entitled to bus transport or a travel subsidy. The West (bus one) and South and East (bus two) routes can be found here. Contact the office for further information. 

Complaints and concerns: If you have any concerns about your child, please contact your child’s teacher in the first instance. If concerns are of a more general nature or you feel a concern about your child has not been addressed properly, please come in and see Matua Rob. In the event that things still haven't been resolved then you may have a formal complaint that will need to be addressed by the Board of Trustees.

Communicating with parents, whaanau and the wider community: We communicate digitally wherever we can via the HERO app, our school Facebook page, our website, and email.

Contacting us: You can contact the school in the following ways:
By phone: 07 829 8820 -  Press 1 to leave an absentee notice.  Press 2 for the Office.
​After School Care (2.30 - 5.30pm): 022 508 5973
To the office via email: office@whatawhata.school.nz   

Digital devices and cyber safety: The school has a large number of digital devices. Some classes encourage children to bring digital devices though this is not compulsory. They will advise you of this. Any devices that connect through our network, whether personal or school-owned, are filtered. Learning about online safety is part of our digital technologies learning. Phones are not allowed at school. We are not a BYOD school

Eating: Children are encouraged to bring healthy food and are not allowed lollies, sugary drinks or take-aways at school. We are a para kore - zero waste school so ask that lunch boxes are litter-free. Children are required to take all their lunch waste home although food scraps containers are available. 

Hats: All students need a bucket style hat in terms 1 and 4. They are not able to play outside without one. Any bucket hat will do but school logo hats are available from Direct Group. Sunscreen is available for children to use.

Hours: The school operates the following schedule:
8.00 - 8.30 Children can arrive
8.30 - 10.30 Learning time
10.30 - 11.00 Eating then play time
11.00 - 12.00 Learning time
12.00 - 1.00 Eating then play time
​1.00 - 2.30 Learning time
Children cannot access classrooms before 8am.

Invoices and accounts: The school sends out a Request for Payment by email, when a charge has been applied to your account.  Statements are sent out monthly by email. These need to be paid within 14 days. Payments are preferred to be made through the HERO app or direct credit into our school bank account. Information can be found here


Late arrivals and leaving early: If your child is late, please ensure they report to the office before going to class. If your child needs to leave before 2.30pm, you need to come to the office to sign them out.

Lost property: Our school generates a huge amount of lost property. Please ensure your child’s clothes and belongings are named. Lost property is placed in the shed by the container. 

Mihi whakatau: This is our welcome for all new children and their families. They are held on the first Monday of each term (weather permitting).

Parking and road safety: Everyone needs to follow the parking and road safety plan to keep our children safe. This can be found here

​School donation:  There is no school donation, as we have opted into the Ministries Donation Scheme.

School news and information sharing: All our information comes home via School newsletter, email. Learning is shared via our school Facebook page. for more details on how we communicate and how to sign up.
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Sickness or injury at school: If your child becomes sick or gets hurt they will be taken care of as the trained first aid staff believe best. This may include administering non-prescription medicines like Pamol if you’ve signed the permission form. Prescription medicine can only be administered with written permission provided to the office. If your child has been unwell, needs special care or has been given medication let the office know so we can continue to support them in school. In severe cases, we will contact you to collect your child from school. In emergencies, emergency services may be contacted first. 

Sports: The school co-ordinates a range of out of school sports teams for children. These are largely managed and run by parent volunteers.  Sports are optional and fees payable for these sports, will be charged to your childs account. 

Stationery: Every child needs a particular range of stationery for learning. This can be purchased online at https://www.myschool.co.nz/Whatawhata. You can also buy it yourself, please ask at the office for a class list, stationery list for the next years learning will also go home with your child's report. If your child requests extra stationery from the office through the year this will be given to them immediately and  charged to your account. 

Swimming: Children swim almost every day in term one. Please send togs and towels daily and name everything!

Trips and visits: The school builds a number of learning opportunities away from the school into its learning programmes. These provide new learning contexts and challenges for our students. Notices with permission slips attached will be sent home for you to sign.

​Uniform: Children are required to wear the school uniform every day. It consists of a school shirt, fleece or hoodie, and plain navy blue shorts, skort, tights or pants. Shoes are optional. All items can be purchased from Direct Group, though bottoms can also be purchased elsewhere. We encourage you to put a spare change of clothes in bags if your child likes getting mucky!

Waste: We try to minimise the waste the school produces and we reduce, reuse and recycle wherever we can. Children are required to take all their lunch waste home although food scraps containers are available. The scraps are used to feed our school chickens, local pigs and to make compost for our gardens.