Congratulations to our Student Leadership Team (Kaitiakiawhina) for 2025. This is a supercharged and talented group of wahine who have already contributed to the College in so many ways and have now won formal leadership roles after a very rigorous and competitive application and interview process.

Head Prefect - Maia Poutawera

Deputy Head Prefects: Learning - Senu Guruge

Sport - Onnah Baxter

Arts - Anjali Pillay

Spirit - Honey Marinas

Te Ao Maori - Manawa McLeod

Communications and Publicity - Elea Hargreaves

Cultural Diversity - Eden Tapsell

These amazing leaders are joined by a strong team of Prefects who will continue to make a positive difference in our school. Our leaders will be formally introduced to the school at our next assembly.

Academic and Sporting Excellence

In addition to the $550k worth of tertiary scholarships awarded to our year 13 students who also had three students accept overseas posts and or scholarships for their sporting codes. One in Squash and two in Basketball.

Kyla Chen not only gained scholarship passes as a Year 12 student last year, but she was also invited to attend the Mathematical Olympiad and was named one of the top 4 girls in maths in NZ. We continue to be super proud of Kyla as not only is she an amazing mathematician, but she shares her passion for the subject with others. Kyla is also one of our prefects!

Ansh Dhot, our Head Prefect in 2024, has been offered two unconditional offers to attend Cambridge University and University College London while Kiarney Sperling, our Deputy Head Prefect of Communications in 2024 has a $160k Scholarship to attend University in Brisbane, Australia. Lastly, Payten Coder, Erina Islam, Hyeonchae Kim, and Jimin Lee all spent a weekend in Hong Kong recently! They were invited to visit Jane Street ( which is a quantitative trading firm and liquidity provider with a unique focus on technology and collaborative problem-solving). These students are not only being empowered but empowering others to make a positive impact. Kia kaha to all of our wonderful alumni.

NCEA Results and Scholarship

Our NCEA results reflect the enormous changes to Level 1 (this was the largest change in 20 years) but as always our pass rates sit above both the national average and our equity index (former decile rating). We have chosen to remain with NCEA as our qualification as it enables all of our learners to experience a pathway onwards into a myriad of qualification opportunities and also an experience of sitting examinations before the ‘high stakes’ NCEA Level 2 year. Congratulations to all our students who attained NCEA qualifications.

Congratulations also to our 13 NZQA Scholarship awardees. Special congratulations to Layla Hoskin and Payten Conder for their ‘Outstanding’ grade, the highest grade to be awarded. Payten also gained two additional scholarship results and Erina Islam gained 3. Scholarship results were in Chemistry, English, History, Biology, Computer Science, Statistics, Calculus, Physics, and Agriculture and Horticulture. It is a credit to our amazing and dedicated teaching staff that have enabled these learners to realise their potential.

Attendance does matter and it has consequences

As learning areas reflect on their academic results, there is clear evidence that those students who did well attended at least 85% of the time. When attendance dropped, so did their achievement. Tauranga Girls’ College learners not reaching ‘at least 85% attendance’ will miss out on the opportunity to engage in tournaments, school ball, leadership retreats, camps, and the like, as these are all privileges. Please ensure your young person or daughter attends school at least 85% of the time, and where they cannot attend, you call or email the school.

Mental Health and Well-being - Phone Free Kura

Let us not forget our well-being now that school has returned. Learning, being active, noticing, connecting, and giving are five ways to support your well-being. Being a phone-free kura certainly helps the wellbeing of our young people. 97% of students met this expectation last year and since the ban, we have enjoyed students engaging with peers through conversation, and getting involved in lunchtime activities, and all of this has reduced their screen time and social media use, allowing a focus on the present, learning, and people.

Bus Challenges

We are very aware of the traffic delays caused by roading improvements and also of the pressure on school bus services. In particular, we are doing our best to identify bus routes requiring additional services. A bus survey was asked to be completed by all bus students. Without this data, it is difficult for us to fully gauge the complexities some have described with the current bus network. Thank you to those students who are biking to school, using public transport, and supporting the reduction of vehicle congestion on the road network. Parents, please ensure you are dropping off and picking up in a safe manner from 22 Avenue.

Welcome to new colleagues and supporting roll growth

Tauranga Girls’ College welcomed several new support and teaching staff. Nau mai haere mai to our colleagues. We have Renay Jones who joins us as DP and a member of our Senior Leadership Team. Renay has a wealth of experience as DP and joins us as the talented Kylie Valentine, takes up her study leave this year. Kylie is a courageous leader who models being a learner. We wish her all the best this year and look forward to having her back again in November.

Health and Safety and school improvements - update

A significant drainage programme has been completed in the College. Further painting took place over the summer holidays and Puwhenua/J Block is weeks away from its official blessing and handover. Details to follow once we have a final date!

Expectations whilst at school

As we begin this term, please ensure your daughter or young person respects our school's values and maintains their high standards and expectations in and around the school. This includes the phone-free kura, jewellery, uniform, and behaviour expectations.

Our College's values or uara provide the basis upon which our expectations are built.

Connecting at Tauranga Girls’ College

Don't forget to connect with us and be kept up to date with our two social media platforms (Facebook and Instagram), our fortnightly pānui, the Tauranga Girls’ College website, the parent portal (including for attendance), and checking your emails. If you have any queries, do not hesitate to email my colleagues. Their email addresses can be found on our website.

Finally, it is exciting to see our new tohu/logo in action! Our tagline is ‘ A Place of Discovery’ as the overwhelming feedback spoke of the enormous array of opportunities that this school offered in the Arts, Sports, Culture, and Academic pursuits.

Tara Kanji

Tumuaki/Principal