Bad weather seemed to be to blame for particularly low attendance in schools in the top of the South Island. Photo: Unsplash/ Taylor Flowe
Daily school attendance dropped to 71 percent on Friday, the lowest figure recorded so far this year.
It was the last day of the school term and Education Ministry figures showed 759,000 pupils should have been in class, but only 539,500 turned up.
That saw attendance rates tumble around the country after being in the mid to high 80 percents for most of term 2.
Bad weather appeared to be to blame for especially low attendance in the top of the South Island.
Just 20 percent of children in the Tasman region were at school on Friday and in Marlborough the figure was 28 percent.
In Nelson, the attendance rate was 59 percent and in Northland and Gisborne it was 61 percent.
No region report attendance higher than 78 percent.
Term 2 traditionally had lower attendance rates than other school terms due to the arrival of winter illnesses.
The lowest daily attendance recorded in term 1 was 80 percent on Friday 7 February - the day after the Waitangi Day statutory holiday.
For much of term 1 daily attendance approached and sometimes reached 90 percent but on the final day of term 1, daily attendance was 82 percent.
Daily attendance needed to be 94 percent in order to reach government targets for regular attendance.
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