Daily school attendance plummeted at the handful of schools still operating past mid-December last year.
Schools have flexibility to select their opening and closing dates within guidelines set by the Education Ministry.
Ministry data indicates that roughly half stayed open during the last possible week of term four, from 15 to 19 December. 2,386 schools typically submit daily attendance data. By Monday, 15 December, only 1,325 remained open and reported data, with 81% of their 361,954 students—about 293,000—present.
By Wednesday that week, reporting schools fell to 763, with only 63 student attendance. By Friday, 19 December—the last possible day of term 4—just 131 schools remained open, recording 59% attendance.
Data showed unjustified absences averaging around 5% for most days of term 4 in 2025. However, during the week of 15-19 December, those rates spiked to 11-28%.
Meanwhile, school time lost to in-term holidays jumped to 3-5%—far exceeding the usual rate of under 1%.
Last year, the Education Review Office reported that term-time holidays posed the biggest attendance challenge for schools.
The government aims for 80% of students to achieve regular attendance, defined as more than 90% class attendance.
Achieving that target requires daily attendance to hit and sustain 94%. Yet term 4 peaked at 90%, frequently dipped to 88-89%, and averaged 85%.
This year, schools must adopt a new attendance system, while the Education Ministry has awarded new contracts to 83 attendance service providers.
Schools may start term one anytime from Monday, 26 January, to Monday, 9 February, and must end term four no later than Friday, 18 December.