Papakura High School

Papakura High School was established in 1954 and is built on the mana whenua of Ngāti Tamaoho. The school is a co-educational, Year 9 to 13+ school and part of the supercity of Auckland with easy rail and motorway links to Auckland city to the North and Waikato and Coromandel to the South. Papakura is shortly to become the terminus of the Waikato-Auckland commuter rail service.

We are a diverse multi-cultural school, with just over 60% of our students being Māori, affiliating to a wide range of iwi backgrounds as well as to the mana whenua of this area, the sub-tribes of Waikato-Tainui. The school also has a large Pasifika community, mainly Samoan and Tongan, but also with Cook Island and Fijian Indian communities, and small numbers of other Pacific Island groups. The remainder are of European/Pakeha heritage.

In 2015 the school joined a community of schools known as the Kootuitui ki Papakura Trust. The Trust's goal is to implement and support the development of digital technology in all of its member schools, as well as having a goal of promoting health and well-being in our community. With the support of the Kootuitui Trust, our school has been able to launch into a digitally based pedagogy for Years 9, 10 and 11 and students are able to lease a chromebook at a very modest weekly cost over a three year period. 

Our school is also one of the seven schools which joined together in 2019 to create the Papakura Kahui Ako. While it is still early days for our Community of Learning, there is a solid bond between the schools in this community, with a clear focus to improve outcomes for the young people of Papakura East and beyond.  

Papakura High is in an exciting phase of its development, with strong roll growth, particularly in the junior school. As these numbers move through the school, there is an anticipation that the school will rapidly return to the substantial size it once enjoyed. As part of this growth, planning has already begun to develop a bilingual/rumaki provision within the school. This will further enhance the opportunities to meet the learning needs and aspirations of the Papakura community.

• Region: Auckland
• Co Ed Status: Co-Educational
• Roll Total: 634
• Authority: State