Source: Radio New Zealand
Whanganui Collegiate. Google Maps
One of the country’s most expensive state-integrated schools, Whanganui Collegiate, is facing an Ombudsman’s investigation, a court case, and scrutiny from the Education Ministry.
The Ombudsman is investigating a complaint about the school’s fees, which are also the subject of legal action by a former school parent unhappy that day students are asked to pay $10,840 for access to facilities owned by the school’s proprietor, the Whanganui College Board.
Meanwhile, the Education Ministry is looking into an apparently illegal and long-standing lease arrangement for a hockey turf.
The Office of the Ombudsman would not provide details of its investigation.
“The Ombudsman is required by law to keep our enquiries secret, and we are unable to comment any further,” it said.
However, it confirmed it had received a complaint about the school’s fees, including those charged to day students – students who attended the school but did not stay in its boarding accommodation.
The school’s website showed they totalled $16,299 a year of which only an “attendance due”, which all state integrated schools charged to cover the cost of property provided by the school’s proprietor, of $2760 was compulsory.
The other fees were optional and included $2410 for meals, $289 for insurance and $10,840 for day students’ use of facilities owned by the proprietor but not part of the integration agreement that made the school part of the state sector from the start of 2013.
RNZ understands the Ombudsman’s investigation centres on the latter fee, which gave students access to parts of the school’s boarding facilities and to sports facilities.
RNZ understands that though the fee is optional, students who did not pay it could be excluded from significant school activities including tutoring and sports events.
The facilities fee was also the subject of a legal case brought by Craig Sinclair, whose children used to attend the school.
RNZ reported last year on Sinclair’s dissatisfaction with the fee, which he said should be a voluntary donation.
Sinclair said as far as he could establish, every other state integrated school asked for donations from day students for access to facilities not covered by their school’s integration agreement – none classed the payment as a fee.
He said the collegiate pursued him over his refusal to pay the fee through the Disputes Tribunal but did not pursue the case when it was moved to the District Court.
Sinclair said he had since filed a claim in the District Court and was waiting for a date for a hearing.
“With their charges, all the parents are paying GST unnecessarily, and they are missing out on the opportunity to claim a donation tax credit and so in the case of my time at collegiate, my family’s potentially missed out on about $30,000. So I’ve filed a claim for that,” he said.
Sinclair said in his view, the school’s charge amounted to a fee for participation in sports events and in the school’s special character.
Meanwhile, the Education Ministry confirmed it had contacted the school about its lease of a hockey turf.
RNZ understands the turf is owned by the WCS Foundation which leased it to the school for $41,000 plus GST.
However, integrated schools were not allowed to lease land or facilities.
The ministry told RNZ the arrangement was in place before the school became a state-integrated school.
“While state schools may lease property with the ministry’s prior consent, there is no provision for the board of an integrated school to lease land or facilities. The role of owning or leasing land and facilities for integrated schools belongs to proprietors,” it said.
“We’re currently talking with the Whanganui Collegiate School Proprietor and the school board about the issue and expect a resolution shortly.”
Whanganui Collegiate acting headmaster Tash Bullock told RNZ the school had no comment at this time.
The school last year told RNZ only one family had refused to pay the optional facilities fee for day students.
Fees and facilities
It’s not the first time the Education Ministry has contacted the school about its financial arrangements.
Emails obtained under the Official Information Act show the Education Ministry in 2024 scrutinised the school’s fees and pushed the school over the course of several months to include a clearer way for parents to opt out of optional charges.
They also show that eight years after being bailed out by the government, the school’s proprietor was spending about half-a-million-dollars a year to provide sport coaching.
The emails showed two ministry staff visited the school in February 2024 to discuss the optional day student fee and the amount of notice families were required to give in order to avoid being charged for a full term’s fees.
In March, a document summarising the situation included an entire section headed “Was it lawful for WCS to charge Boarding Facilities for Day Students (BDfDS) fees in 2023”.
Much of the content was redacted, but it said, in bold: “The proprietor may lawfully exclude non-BDfDS students from House spaces, activities, services and personnel”.
Also redacted from the document were agreed facts on the question: “Is it lawful for a school board to receive a donation, then transfer it to the proprietor?”
The document said the school was unsure, but ministry advice said boards may not donate money to their proprietors.
In June, the ministry asked the school to create a short description of the services purchased through the fee for day students and of the arrangements for students whose families did not opt in.
It asked that the proprietors share a draft with the ministry, which the ministry would check against its fees and donations circular.
In July, the ministry asked the school to provide a specific option for opting in or out of the fee. The school had said families opted in by signing the school’s terms and conditions.
In early September 2024, the ministry wrote to hurry the work along.
“You’ll remember our conversations of 16 August and 23 August about the dues and services for purchase. I stressed the growing urgency of the situation. I am worried that our dialogue has been going a long time and I can’t see the fruit of our work being visible on the website. It’s important that parents have clear and accurate information as they go through the enrolment process for 2025.”
By the end of the month the ministry declared it was happy with changes the school had made.
The emails also showed that eight years after the government allowed the school to become state-integrated in order to avoid closure, the school’s proprietor was donating hundreds-of-thousands of dollar a year to the school for sport coaching.
A ministry document said the donations “totalled almost $400,000 in 2022 and almost $500,000 in 2021”.
The document said the school’s view was that because the proprietor paid for and employed the coaches, it could deny access to extra coaching for any day students whose families did not pay the fee for use of facilities.
It showed that the ministry wanted the school to clarify how students who did not pay the day student fee participated in “Collegiate Weekends”.
The weekends were described as part of the school’s special character and the ministry said all students much have access to that special character.
The ministry also asked for proof that the board, not the school, employed the sports coaches.
Bail-outs and integration
Whanganui Collegiate, formerly Wanganui Collegiate, was a private school until it ran into financial trouble and turned to the government for a bail-out.
The then-National government agreed in 2012 to let it become state integrated in 2013 despite officials’ warnings.
At the time, the change increased the school’s government subsidies from $800,000 to $3 million a year.
In its final year as a private school, Whanganui Collegiate charged day students $10,000 a year and boarders $20,000, with uniform costs of $1500 on top of that.
The school charged slightly more than that when it became integrated and said it had suppressed its fees in its final year as a private entity thanks to nearly $3m in special government funding.
Education Ministry figures show the coeducational Y9-13 school had 409 students last year, more than half of them boys.
The total included 33 international fee-paying students.
In 2012, its final year as a private school, it had 416 students.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
