A Budget on Paper. A Crisis in the Classroom.

By Rebecca Thomas

Our Top Heavy Fraction

When I told people where I was moving for my new role, their faces shifted—eyebrows raised, mouths tensed.

“Why would you go there?” they asked. And I smiled. Because those who know me, know there’s nothing more grounding than kayaking in a storm.

I write from the grassroots. From whānau rooms where tea is poured and truths are told. From classrooms where learning is an act of resilience. Now, I’m writing from a community often cast in deficit terms—too hard, too complex, too broken. But that’s not what I see.

I’ve been here only a short time. But already, I’ve seen how powerful the narrative is that surrounds these schools. A throwaway comment from a visiting teacher:

It’s like working in a zoo

I'm sure it wasn’t meant for harm, but words like that stay. They get whispered into CVs and seep into the way policymakers frame our schools.

But I don’t see a zoo.

I see children in crisis.

I see whānau surviving.

I see educators holding space with compassion and grit, often with nothing but their own presence to carry the weight.

Then Along Comes Budget 2025

I watched closely as the Budget dropped—because when you teach in a community like this, you learn quickly that what gets funded, and what gets cut, changes lives.

Or doesn’t.

There were some hopeful signs. The Government announced:

• $216 million to extend Early Intervention Services into Year 1

• $41 million for behaviour and communication support (including just over 6 educational psychologists and 78 speech-language therapists)

• $122 million to make ORS (ongoing resourcing) demand-driven

• A rollout of approximately 650 Learning Support Coordinators (LSCs) for schools with Years 1–8

  
  

These numbers sound bold. But when you spread them across 2,500 schools, a more sobering picture emerges:

• 6 new psychologists = 1 for every 400 schools

• 78 speech therapists = 1 for every 32 schools

• 45 new Te Kahu Tōī intensive wraparound placements = 1 for every 55 schools

650 LSCs for 2,000+ primary schools = many schools still sharing support

It simply does not touch the ground where the need is deepest.

And at the same time—without much noise—Kāhui Ako funding was axed completely. $375 million gone from collaborative networks that once helped schools share resources, strategies and strength. These networks often helped schools like ours avoid drowning in isolation. Now, another support beam is gone.

Also gone: targeted Pacific education initiatives, curriculum resources for kaupapa Māori education, and the quiet unraveling of culturally sustaining practice under the guise of “reprioritisation.”

We’re told structured literacy, assessment tools and tutoring are coming—but our students are still hungry, still dysregulated, still grieving. They need more than data. They need presence.

People vs Property

The Budget is full of numbers—but here’s what matters: The biggest investments are in property, not people.

Over $700 million is tagged for land, buildings, roll growth classrooms and seismic upgrades.

Meanwhile, the most impactful staffing changes—psychologists, SLTs, wraparound support—are thinly stretched and years away from full delivery.

In a school like mine, buildings don’t build relationships. People do. 

And right now, what we need isn’t a new classroom. It’s a qualified adult in the room. It’s someone who knows how to help a child heal before we ask them to learn. It’s the right person, in the right place, at the right moment.

That’s what turns the tide. Not the floor plan.

This Is What I See Every Day

I see children who come to school hungry—not just for kai, but for safety. For connection.

I see teachers absorbing trauma without language or resourcing to name it.

I see whānau exhausted by systems they can’t navigate, and children navigating grief before the first bell.

To those working in policy, to those drafting strategies and writing speeches—I know some of you are reading this. I know many of you care. But I need you to feel what this looks like.

Because in communities like mine, education is not a pathway—it is a lifeline. It is survival. It is the bridge between intergenerational harm and a different future. It is hope.

Budget lines and strategy documents are not neutral.

They ripple into classrooms.

Into the behaviours of our most vulnerable.

Into the hearts of our teachers.

And those ripples can either uplift—or quietly, systemically—suppress.

When you cut collaboration, you isolate us. When you underfund wellbeing, you destabilise us. When you whitewash the curriculum, you erase us.

So I’m asking: not for pity. Not for headlines. But for policy that understands where the ground is softest—and plants equity there.

To be a teacher here is not a fallback. It is a choice. A powerful, humble, often misunderstood choice to stay when others step back.

For the children in crisis

We do not need another strategy. We need a system that listens.

So let this blog be the echo of our classrooms. Let it travel up the food chain of power. 

Let it remind you: equity doesn’t start in Parliament. It starts here.

In places where a calm classroom is a miracle.

Where a child turning up two days in a row is a win.

Where a teacher choosing to stay is a revolutionary act.

P.S. To those in the Beehive: You want attendance? How about presence—yours. In our classrooms.