Operational funding

Operational funding is the money your board receives from the Government to run your school and to achieve the objectives specified in your charter.

Level of compliance	Main audience	Other
Required	Boards Principals and Tumuaki Administrators

Level of compliance

Main audience

Other

Required

Boards
Principals and Tumuaki
Administrators

School Boards are responsible for the financial governance of their schools, including determining how operational funding is allocated. Boards must comply with the National Administration Guidelines, among many other contractual, legislative and reporting requirements. Further reading is required.

National Administration Guidelines

Operational funding comes with responsibilities. Your board must:

set priorities and manage your school’s total funding
follow the National Administration Guidelines
meet your obligations as good employers
comply with legislative and contractual requirements.

National Administration Guidelines

School funding calculator

You can use the Ministry of Education School Funding Calculator to estimate your school’s upcoming funding.

Ministry of Education School Funding Calculator(external link)

Entitlement staffing

Entitlement staffing gives your Board of Trustees a stable base from which to make long-term decisions about providing for your students’ needs.

Entitlement staffing is derived from your school rolls for each year level using a formula. It’s made up of three components:

Curriculum staffing
Management staffing
Guidance staffing

Entitlement staffing 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

For some components, there’s an application process to determine whether your school is eligible and a calculation process to work out how much funding your school receives.

For further 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 rates

These are used to calculate your school’s operational grant.

Operational funding rates for 2020 and 2021:

All rates are GST inclusive 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’s operational funding quarterly in a bulk grant 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.

Operational funding: quarterly instalment timetable

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 [DOC, 43 KB] and send it to us.

Email your form to:
Accountspayable.Suppliermaintenance@education.govt.nz, or
Post it to:
Finance Division
Ministry of Education
PO Box 1666
Wellington

Operational grant entitlement and instalment notices

Your operational grant entitlement notice says how much operational funding your school receives. Your operations grant instalment notice says how much each quarterly instalment is.

For more information on grant and instalment notices, visit the Operations grant entitlement and instalment notices page.

How operational funding is calculated

We use resourcing rolls to calculate your operational funding. They are based on your school’s roll count with some 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 How operational funding is calculated – resourcing rolls page.
For information about the roll return process, including when your roll returns are due, visit the Roll returns (monitoring) page.

School deciles and deciles review

School deciles indicate the extent the school draws its students from low socio-economic communities. Each year, your school can request a review of its decile if you believe your catchment area or socio-economic circumstances have changed significantly.

For more information on how deciles are applied to schools, what funding they determine, and where to find schools’ deciles, visit the School deciles page. For information on the review process, including how to apply and when to apply, visit the Deciles review page.

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 levies

The international student levy applies to international fee-paying students enrolled at state or state-integrated schools. 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 levies page.

Last reviewed: 11 January 2021 Has this been useful? Give us your feedback