Operational funding
Operational funding is the money your board receives from the Government to run your school or kura and to achieve the objectives specified in your charter.
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School boards are responsible for the financial governance of their school or kura, including determining how operational funding is allocated.
Boards must comply with the National Administration guidelines, among many other contractual, legislative and reporting requirements. More reading is required.
- School funding calculator
- Entitlement staffing
- Operational funding components
- Operational funding rates
- Operational funding payments
- Operational funding entitlement and instalment
- How operational funding is calculated
- Equity Index
- Risk Management Scheme
- International Student Levy
School funding calculator
You can use the school funding calculator for your school or kura.
School funding calculator(external link)
You can view the operational funding entitlement and instalments approved for your school or kura in Pourato.
Entitlement staffing
Entitlement staffing gives your board a stable base from which to make long-term decisions about providing for your students’ needs. It is derived from your school or kura rolls for each year level using a formula.
Entitlement staffing is made up of 3 components:
- curriculum staffing
- management staffing
- guidance staffing.
It also drives the calculation of salary units, and middle management and senior management allowances.
For further information on entitlement staffing, salary units, and middle management and senior management allowances, visit the entitlement staffing page.
Our banking staffing page provides guidance on managing your entitlement.
Operational funding components
There is an application process for some components to determine whether your school is eligible and a calculation process to work out how much funding your school receives.
For more information and a list to find out what the funding components are for, which schools are eligible and how we calculate the funding amounts, visit the operational funding components page.
Operational funding components
Operational funding rates
These are used to calculate your school or kura operational funding entitlement
Operational funding rates for 2024 and 2025:
Operational grant rates 2024 and 2025 [XLSX, 33 KB]
Operational grant rates 2024 and 2025 [PDF, 234 KB]
All rates are GST exclusive unless otherwise stated.
If you have any questions around the operational funding rates email: resourcing@education.govt.nz.
Operational funding payments
The Ministry pays your school or kura operational funding on a quarterly basis by direct credit to your board’s bank account. The funding year starts on 1 January and ends on 31 December.
Quarterly instalment timetable
- We pay your quarterly funding instalments in advance at the beginning of each funding period.
- We do this to ensure that your board receives 100% of its entitlement for the current year in the current year.
- Instalments will be published in Pourato each quarter.
Instalment paid first working day of |
Period covered |
Number of months |
Percentage of remaining entitlement paid |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | January to March | 3 months | 25% |
| April | April to June | 3 months | 33.3% |
| July | July to September | 3 months | 50% |
| October | October to December | 3 months | 100% |
How to change your bank account details
If you need to change the bank account that we pay your operational funding payments into, you must fill out the change of bank account form and send it to us.
Change of bank account form [DOC, 51 KB]
Email your form to Accountspayable.Suppliermaintenance@education.govt.nz.
Or post it to:
Finance Division
Ministry of Education
PO Box 1666
Wellington
Operational funding entitlement and instalments
You can view your operational funding entitlement in Pourato to find out how much operational funding your school receives for the school year.
For more information visit operational entitlement and instalments page.
Operations entitlement and instalments
Pourato – Applications & Online Systems(external link)
How operational funding is calculated
Pourato uses resourcing rolls to calculate operational funding. It is based on the roll count of your school or kura, with adjustments depending on the time of year, your school type, and whether we receive your roll count on time.
For more information on resourcing rolls visit the operational funding – resourcing rolls page.
How operational funding is calculated – resourcing rolls
For information about the roll return process, including when your roll returns are due, visit the roll returns (monitoring) page.
Equity Index
The Equity Index is a new way to identify and respond to socio-economic barriers in schools and kura.
Equity funding, in addition to core funding, is received by schools and kura so they can work in different ways to reduce the impact socio-economic factors have on student achievement.
Visit the pages below to find out more information on how the Equity Index works and how it is applied to funding to schools and kura.
How the Equity Index applies to funding
The Risk Management Scheme
Schools can join the Ministry of Education’s Risk Management Scheme to get comprehensive contents and liability insurance for state and state-integrated schools.
For more information on the scheme, including how to join and how to make a claim, visit the Risk Management Scheme page.
International Student Levy
The International Student Levy applies to international fee-paying students enrolled at state or state-integrated school or kura. The levy does not apply to exchange or New Zealand Aid Programme (NZAID) students.
For more information on the scheme, including how the levy is calculated and debited, visit the International Student Levy page.
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