All posts by Ben Doughney

School News

Auckland Schools Mumps Outbreak

The Auckland Regional Public Health Service is managing a mumps outbreak in Auckland. More than 35 cases have been confirmed so far and more than half of these are occurring in children and teens aged 10-19 years.

“I urge parents to check with their doctors to ensure their families’ measles mumps and rubella vaccinations are up to date. I recommend this is done before the school holidays. Vaccination is free and it will protect your child and the community,” says Medical Officer of Health Dr Michael Hale.

Mumps can spread quickly among those who are not immune, particularly in schools. A single child with mumps at secondary school could cause an outbreak, because immunity in that age group is well below the national average.

“If parents do not organise vaccination quickly, their children’s learning could be disrupted. We are in the midst of an outbreak and already large numbers of students are scrambling to catch up on school work after falling ill with mumps for several weeks,” says Dr Hale.

Most people recover from mumps, but it can have serious complications. Although rare, infertility can occur. The disease can also cause inflammation of tissue surrounding the brain (meningitis), inflamed testicles or ovaries and deafness.

“The best way to avoid getting an infectious disease like mumps is to ensure you are fully immunised with the MMR vaccine,” says Dr Hale.

Learn more about mumps on the ARPHS website and about mumps vaccination [PDF]

School News

Mr. Neil Penfold moving to Selwyn College

We would like to inform the community that Neil Penfold has been appointed to the Senior Management team of Selwyn College. Mr Penfold has been with the college since July 2013 and he has served the college admirably as Mountains Whanau DP since that time. Mr Penfold’s replacement will start at the beginning of term 3.

Principal's Blog

e-asTTle

At Mission Heights Junior College we use e-asTTle tests at the beginning, middle and end of the year to help us gain an insight into the numeracy and literacy abilities of our students. This data in turn helps us to personalise and cater for the diverse learning needs of our students, it is also used to help us measure student progress.

At the completion of each test each student has an ‘Individual Learning Pathway’ report that is generated for them. This report allows them and us as their teachers to identify their strengths and weaknesses. This is the report that your child will share with you in their Student Led Conference.

Understanding_an_e-asTTle_report

The report is divided up into four quadrants:

  • Achieved (Yellow) – questions that, given the student’s overall e-asTTle score (in the appropriate curriculum area), should have been answered correctly and were.
  • Strengths (Green)– questions that were expected to be answered incorrectly, given the student’s overall e-asTTle score, but were answered correctly. These questions are more difficult than his/her overall ability. However for reading, it is possible for a student to have correctly guessed the answer to questions that would normally be outside their ability range. While such responses will be excluded from the student’s level calculation, the questions will still display in the Strengths box.
  • Gaps (Red) – questions that, given the student’s overall e-asTTle score should have been answered correctly but were incorrect. These are questions that would be expected to be relatively easy for the student. This is an area where teachers will investigate to determine the reason. It may be due to carelessness, skipping questions, illness or not having being taught it yet. As these questions are at a level easier than the student’s overall ability, it is expected that the student should be able to learn this information quickly.
  • To Be Achieved (Blue) – questions that were expected to be answered incorrectly, given the student’s overall e-asTTle score, and were answered incorrectly. These questions signify areas that the student has yet to achieve and in which it is expected they will require more teaching and learning of strategies to achieve in this/these areas moving forward.

It is possible for the same objective to be listed in multiple quadrants, because the questions relating to a single objective may be of varying curriculum levels.

A question may appear more than once in the same quadrant. This is because a question may have more than one objective associated with it.

More information about the ILP reports can be found here.

We have recently developed and are trialling a new tool which will see students identify the area of most concern in the ‘To Be Achieved (Blue)’ box of their report and make a goal using strategies to target this area of weakness. We are hoping that by doing this students will have a better understanding of the reports, their own capabilities and take more ownership of their learning between tests by making and revisiting goals around their needs.

At the completion of the test an overall score is generated for each student, from these scores we are able to identify if students are ‘well below’, ‘below’, ‘at’ or ‘above’ where they should be for their cohort nationally. This information is outlaid in the ‘MHJC Traffic Lighting’ for reading and maths and is used by teachers to personalise the learning of students with level appropriate texts and tasks. This differentiation and personalisation of learning is important in order to help students make positive shifts towards where they need to be to meet cohort expectation or to extend them and provide them with the necessary challenge needed if they are working above level.

School News

Alanna Young Thanked for Considerable Service to MHJC’s BOT

IMG_0538

​Mrs ​Alanna ​Young ​will be standing down​ as Board Chair​ this year and ​wishes ​to thank the Board and community for their support over 8 years of service. ​Alanna​ has ​thoroughly ​enjoyed working on the Board of Trustees and for the school​​ – supporting the school’s ​vision​ “​Growing Greatness through ​innovative, ​constantly evolving​ and personalised learning”​.

Alanna was co-opted as a parent representative onto the Establishment Board of Mission Heights Junior College in 2008, a year prior to its opening in 2009. In 2010, she was elected as Board Chairperson and continued in that capacity until ​the ​beginning of this year. ​Mr ​Blair Telfer has now been elected as Board Chairperson, to aid succession planning with the Triennial Board Elections coming up shortly.

Mission Heights Junior College is ​certainly ​a better place due to the strong leadership and support Alanna has given the school​.

Enrolment

Enrolment Information

Mission Heights Junior College is open for students in Years 7 to 10. MHJC will not enroll students under the age of 10 years.

An Information Evening for prospective students enrolling for 2026 will be held on Wednesday 30th July from 6:00pm to 7:15pm. This will be a good opportunity to meet the principal, members of staff and students and go on a tour of the school.

IN ZONE STUDENTS

Enrolment applications for in-zone students open from Monday 9th June 2025, closing on Friday 29th August, 2025.

In zone students can enrol by following the link to our 2 stage enrolment form below. Before you begin the enrolment process, please ensure you have digital copies of the documents below ready. Please note that we cannot accept an enrolment without these documents.

Online Enrolment Form

If you do not receive an email link to your email when using the online enrolment form, please check your spam box. If you have any enquiries, please contact us at enrolment@mhjc.school.nz please note we cannot answer technical queries at this email address.

下面是入学需要的文件Download
Danh sách kiểm tra tuyển sinh bằng tiếng việtDownload

Technical Problems when Enrolling

Most technical difficulties experienced when trying to enrol online can be solved by simply following the steps below;

Documents Required when Enrolling at MHJC

  • Student’s birth certificate
  • Student’s passport for proof of citizenship
  • If resident or non-resident, a valid student or resident visa. Parent visas in this case are also required.
  • School report if your previous school was not Baverstock Oaks School or Mission Heights Primary School
  • Signed copy of the Parent Cybersafety Agreement form
  • Student’s immunisation certificates (including Covid vaccination if applicable)
  • Legal custody parenting order (if applicable)

For homeowners :-

  • Proof of your address #1 : Sales and Purchase Agreement. We also accept Auckland Council rates bills or Watercare bills.
  • Proof of your address #2 : Electricity bill, House, contents or car insurance policy that is current with your name and address)

For people who are renting in-zone :-

  • Proof of your address #1 : Tenancy Agreement which must be valid for the period of 12 months from the first day the student commences school at MHJC and it must be a council approved rateable dwelling of which your family are the occupants. Boarding, flatting and homestays are not permitted.
  • Proof of your address #2 : Tenancy Services Bond Lodgment Receipt from the Department of building and housing
  • Proof of your address #3 : Electricity bill, House, contents or car insurance policy that is current with your name and address

For parents living with family in-zone :-

  • Statutory declaration form(s). With these forms, we require the following :-
    • One of the following where applicable;
      • Sales & Purchase Agreement of the property owner
      • Rental Agreement
      • Signed shared rental agreement
    • If renting, signed and witnessed Owner / Head Tenant Statutory Declaration form
    • Signed and witnessed Parents / Caregivers Statutory Declaration form
    • a current electricity bill of the property at that address
    • a bill or letter addressed to the parent at that address

Please note that we do not accept bank statements or handphone bills. We can request further documents if the above are not satisfied.

JPG, PDF, PNG or DOC file types are accepted.

Parents/Caregivers Statutory Declaration FormDownload
Owner/Head Tenant Statutory Declaration FormDownload
ICT Parent Cybersafety Agreement FormDownload

OUT OF ZONE STUDENTS

Please note that there might be a limited number of spaces for out of zone students of siblings who are currently enrolled at MHJC. Please register your interest using this Google Form.

Closing date for applications: 3pm, Wednesday 27th August, 2025.

Ballot date: Wednesday 3rd September, 2025.

Notifications to parents will be sent on or before Wednesday 10th September, 2025.

Priority Category

Priority 1-  applicant is part of a special programme (not applicable for MHJC)
Priority 2 – applicant is the sibling of a current student of the school
Priority 3 – applicant is the sibling of a former student of the school
Priority 4 – applicant is the child of a former student of the school
Priority 5 – applicant is either a child of an employee of the school or a child of a member of the Board of Trustees of the school
Priority 6 – applicant belongs to none of the above

If you have any enquiries, please contact us at enrolment@mhjc.school.nz .