Equity Index (EQI) is a way the

Ministry of Education An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...

uses to calculate equity funding for schools in

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

. It replaced the

socioeconomic decile In the New Zealand education system, decile was a key measure of socioeconomic status used to target funding and support schools. In academic contexts the full term "socioeconomic decile" or "socioeconomic decile band" was used. A school's decil ...

system, which was phased out from January 2023.

Background

In September 2019 the Sixth Labour Government announced the decile system would be replaced by a new "Equity Index" which would come into effect as early as 2021. In mid-May 2022, the 2022 New Zealand budget allocated $8 million for the capital cost and $293 million for operating costs for the new Equity Index, but no date of introduction was given.

Implementation

In July 2022, their Equity Index rating numbers were advised to New Zealand (state and state-integrated) schools to be introduced in 2023. The Statistics Department utilised 37 socio-economic factors for each pupil, including both parents' educational levels, imprisonment data and benefit history plus Oranga Tamariki notifications and student transience to calculate a school index number between 344 and 569 for each school, with a national average of 463 and a higher index number meaning more EQI index funding. The New Zealand educational system was claimed to be "one of the world's least equal education systems" (actually 33 out of 38 in the OECD).

Bands and groups

For statistical and analytical purposes, schools are divided into seven bands and then into three groups based on their EQI. The three groups refer to the socioeconomic barriers: "fewer", "moderate", and "more", and are roughly equivalent to "high-decile", "mid-decile", and "low-decile" respectively under former the socioeconomic decile system.

References

Education in New Zealand Socio-economic statistics {{edu-stub

Background

Implementation

Bands and groups

See also

References