Falling Rolls

It is a fact that there will be fewer and fewer children at school as the 1980s go on. The prospect is felt by teachers as a threat both to their job security, and also to the quality of education they can offer. Except in favoured areas, all schools will experience staff losses. The two schools featured in this article, Hagley High School and Riccarton High School, have taken imaginative approaches to the problem. Both schools have already faced rapid roll decline.
The first response of their teachers was despondency and fear. But they fought back with intelligent use of their professional
skills. Hagley has become a 'community' school, Riccarton, while remaining a conventional secondary school, is a model of administrative innovation and open communication.