Secondary Student Handbook

Once you move into the Secondary School — Years 9 to 13 — your role at Renew School changes, and so do the responsibilities that come with it. These are the years in which you prepare, spiritually and academically, for whatever God calls you to next: work, training, or further study. They are also the years in which you carry the most influence over the culture of this school.

As the older students here, you are watched. Younger students copy what you model, whether or not you mean them to. That is a privilege and a weight, and we would rather name it plainly than pretend otherwise.

This handbook sets out how the Secondary School works and what we expect of you. Knowing what is expected removes guesswork — for you and for the staff who teach you. It also frees you from a rule-focused way of living, where the worry is about getting caught, into a settled way of living where you simply know you are doing right.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:2 (ESV) — the verse our school is named for

How to use this handbook

This handbook describes expectations and routines in plain language. It is not the school's policy library. Renew School's formal policies and procedures are hosted on SchoolDocs, and SchoolDocs is the authoritative source wherever the two differ.

Term dates, bell times, the newsletter, subject options booklets and the dress code are published on the school website. Your attendance, timetable and reports are in Helix, the school's student management system.

Our motto

Renew School takes its name and its motto from Romans 12:2 — “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind.” Everything in this handbook flows from that one idea: that God changes people from the inside out, and that the mind is where that change begins. Renewal is not something the school does to you. It is something God does in you, and something you cooperate with.

Our mission

Renew School exists:

• to provide for students a sound, basic Christian education that is loyal to the Bible and Christ-centred, promoting those values and standards, and recognising that Christian spiritual values permeate all curriculum areas; and
• to provide for parents and guardians an alternative choice of school for developing their children to their full potential in God.

Our special character

Renew School is a state-integrated school with a Christian special character, operating as a ministry of Renew Church, our Proprietor and Controlling Authority. Special character is not decoration on top of an ordinary school — it is the reason the school exists, and it is protected in law through our Deed of Integration.

In practice it means our special character states that this school will provide an environment where students, parents and teachers experience godly relationships in a safe place, showing the character of Christ in love, respect, honour and trust. Everything in this handbook — the rules, the routines, the way we handle conflict — exists to protect that.

God is not a subject

We do not teach a normal curriculum with Bible added on. God is the source of all knowledge, not one topic among many, so a Biblical worldview runs through every learning area. Our staff are practising Christians, and they teach as people who are living what they teach.

Our school culture

Our culture is one which:

• is welcoming of newcomers and visitors
• shares the belief that we are part of something great that God is doing — a Biblical worldview
• instils godly confidence, faith and a sense of purpose
• honours God, His Word, and our relationship with Him
• creates the conditions for effective learning
• cultivates excellence and wellbeing in all its members
• celebrates successes
• is honest about how our behaviour affects others
• produces effective communicators who encourage others
• respects and responds rightly to authority
• promotes responsible stewardship
• expresses who we are through literature, science and the arts
• is inclusive, showing preference to one another
• expresses God's love in caring for and serving others
• is current and relevant to young people

Your personal life

Your habits and disciplines shape every other area of your life, including your academic progress. We encourage you to make reading the Bible and praying a daily habit — mornings are usually best. Scripture teaches that these habits lay the foundation for everything else.

Your form class

Every secondary student belongs to a form class, grouped by year level. Your form class is where the day begins and ends: roll, devotions, notices, pastoral check-in, and the ordinary business of being known by an adult who is looking out for you.

Your form teacher keeps your attendance record, monitors your academic progress, contributes to your reports, and is your first point of contact when something is going wrong — academically or otherwise. Go to them first.

Christian Life Skills (CLS)

The 8:45–9:10 am block and the 3:00–3:10 pm block are Christian Life Skills time. Across the week this is where assembly, chapel, form time and deliberate character teaching sit. It is timetabled, not spare time, and attendance is expected in the same way as any class.

Assembly

Monday morning is whole-school assembly — Years 0 to 13 together. It is the one time in the week the entire school gathers. We worship, we hear from speakers, and important notices are given. Respectful participation is expected; as senior students, the way you sing, sit and listen sets the standard the juniors will follow.

Chapel

Chapel is on Thursday mornings for Years 9 to 13. It usually opens with corporate worship, followed by a message — from staff, pastors, visiting ministries, or from students themselves. Sometimes we split into smaller groups.

Rākau — our houses

Every secondary student is placed in one of four rākau, our vertical house groups: Matai, Rimu, Totara and Tawa.

Rākau are how we compete — inter-house events, with a strong sports focus. In 2026 that is what rākau are for; they are not used for anything beyond inter-house competition.

Each rākau is led by its most senior students. Because a rākau spans Years 9 to 13, it is one of the few settings where you mix outside your own year group, and where the seniors get to lead and encourage the juniors. If you are one of those seniors, that leadership is real and people are watching how you use it. Represent your rākau well.

School and home together

Renew School works as a partner to your family, not a replacement for it. The Bible places the first responsibility for a young person's formation on the home, and we take that seriously. Where you are struggling, we will work with your parents rather than around them. Expect that we will talk to them, and expect that they will back us.

Bell times

You must be on site by 8:40 am. The day begins at 8:45 am.

Take everything you need for Periods 1 and 2 with you after the morning roll check, and everything for Periods 3 and 4 straight after morning break. Do not plan on returning to your form room between periods — it interrupts other people's classes.

Note that primary students finish at 3:00 pm and secondary students at 3:10 pm. If you have younger siblings, that ten minutes is deliberate.

Term dates 2026

Teacher Only Days (no school for students) in 2026: Friday 29 May and Friday 21 August. Public holidays: Waitangi Day Friday 6 February, ANZAC Day Monday 27 April, King's Birthday Monday 1 June, Labour Day Monday 26 October.

Attendance and absence

You are required to attend every school day, and to be in every class — including form class at the start and end of the day. Being at school but somewhere other than where you are timetabled is not attendance. If something will make you late, tell your teacher.

• When you are going to be absent, your parent or caregiver contacts the school.
• If you miss classes, it is your job — not your teacher's — to find out what you missed and catch up.
• Prolonged absence needs a doctor's certificate, particularly where you have missed assessments.
• Separate rules apply where NCEA assessment is involved. Ask your subject teacher early, not afterwards.

Renew School has an Attendance Management Plan published on the school website. Attendance is recorded in Helix and is visible to your parents.

What we expect of you as a learner

Staff assume you want to achieve. That assumption shapes how you are taught. You are expected to work to the best of your ability and to meet the standards your teachers set.

Effective learning environments are built by teachers and students together. Where behaviour gets in the way, guidance and pastoral help will be offered — but the learning of the whole class takes precedence over the preferences of any one student. Classroom learning feeds directly into your assessment results; the two are not separate.

Classroom code of conduct

“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”

Matthew 22:36–39 (ESV)

Love God. Love people. In the classroom that looks like:

• being on time and ready to start work
• bringing the materials you need
• listening to your teacher and following instructions
• working to learn and to finish the work
• treating other people and their belongings with respect
• staying in your seat unless directed otherwise
• listening when others speak, and waiting your turn
• caring for the classroom and its equipment

Study and homework

Secondary study will require work outside class time. Study at home builds mastery through practice, teaches you to find information for yourself, and forces you to manage your own time — which is the skill that carries into everything after school.

Some study will be directed by your teachers. In other areas your teachers will show you how to study for yourself. Treat study at home as part of one continuous line of learning, not an optional extra.

Subjects and courses

Renew School offers NCEA through NZQA achievement standards, with a mix of internal and external assessment. Full details, including prerequisites, are in the subject options booklets on the school website.

Years 9 and 10

• Full-year core: Bible/Social Studies, English, Mathematics, Science, Physical Education
• Half-year core: Technology
• Arts — choose two half-year courses from Drama, Visual Art, Music
• Languages — choose one full-year course from Te Reo Māori, Chinese, or a Te Kura language
• Other — choose one half-year course from Market Day Business, Toi Māori

Year 11

• Compulsory: Bible, English, Mathematics, Science
• Choose three options from: Business Studies, Drama, Chinese, Geography, Te Reo Māori, History, Music, Physical Education, Technology, Visual Art, Te Kura

Year 11 sits at NCEA Level 1, but Renew School does not offer the Level 1 qualification. Instead you work towards Level 2 across two years: Year 11 lays the foundation, and you attempt Level 2 in Year 12. This is deliberate. It gives you a year to build the skills and habits that make Level 2 achievable, rather than spreading you thin across a qualification we do not think serves you well.

Year 12

• Compulsory: Bible, English, Mathematics
• Choose three options from: Biology, Business Studies, Chemistry, Drama, History, Music, Physical Education, Physics, Technology, Visual Art

Year 13

• Compulsory: Bible
• Choose five options from: Biology, Business Studies, Calculus, Chemistry, Drama, English, History, Music, Physical Education, Physics, Statistics, Technology, Te Kura, Visual Art
• Entry requirements apply to Calculus and Statistics — check the booklet

Trade and vocational pathways

If you are heading towards a trade, you are not limited to what is taught in this building. Renew School students can complete Gateway, STAR and Trades Academy courses for credit at local tertiary institutions — real training, in a real workplace or campus, counting towards your qualification.

If that is your direction, say so early. Talk to the Associate Principal: Secondary, because these placements need to be arranged in advance and built into your timetable.

If the subject you need is not listed

Te Kura provides distance learning courses where we cannot offer a subject ourselves. If the subject you need for your career path is not on the list, say so — as the options booklet puts it, just because an option is not listed does not mean we cannot make it available to you. Talk to the Associate Principal: Secondary.

The point of the rules

What follows is a long list of routines and boundaries. Every institution and every workplace has them. Knowing them and working within them is what makes learning — or later, employment — go well. To do the right thing, you first have to know what the right thing is; setting it out removes the assumptions that both students and teachers otherwise carry.

The aim is not rule-keeping for its own sake. Rule-focus breeds guilt and shame. Choosing to do right brings freedom. We would rather you enjoyed school knowing you are living well than spent it worrying about getting caught.

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

John 10:10 (ESV)

What behaviour management is for

Behaviour flows out of what goes through our minds, which is shaped by what we let into them. Our expectation is that behaviour in a Christian school reflects Christian character, with Jesus as the example. The goal is enjoying doing right — not living as close to the boundary as you can get.

Discipline at Renew is a joint venture between school and home. Our procedures aim to build a student who:

• manages themselves with self-control and self-discipline — this is what maturity looks like
• relates well to others, and is willing to restore a relationship that has been damaged
• communicates effectively with people of all ages
• recognises and respects authority and deadlines
• participates and contributes, as part of God's will being worked out in their life

Where things go wrong, consequences may include detentions or removal from the learning environment, and may eventually lead to stand-down or suspension, which may lead to exclusion. The full behaviour management policy is on SchoolDocs.

Specific expectations

You are expected to act in an orderly and respectful way, maintaining Christian standards of courtesy, kindness and honesty; to show respect to those in authority over you; and to respect other students and their property.

• Your behaviour reflects and upholds Christian standards and principles. Unacceptable behaviour will be met with consequences and may require restitution.
• Take care of your own property, other people's property, and the school's. School bags stay in form rooms during the school day, except when changing for PE.
• You will not threaten, harass or hurt another student, or in any way actively seek their unhappiness.
• Obey adult authority on school grounds and on field trips.
• Treat all staff and supervising adults with respect, and address them as Mr, Mrs or Miss followed by their surname.
• No running inside the buildings or on the stairs and balcony.
• Keep left on stairs and the balcony when there is two-way traffic.
• Close doors to rooms where the heat pumps are running, both entering and leaving.
• Ride bikes, scooters and skateboards responsibly to and from school, not at school. Ride only your own, wear a helmet, and lock your bike while you are here.

Bullying

Bullying is unacceptable. It is deliberate hurtful behaviour, carried out directly, through other people, or through technology. It includes physical assault, verbal assault (name-calling, racist or sexist remarks), spreading rumours or gossip, texting or messaging, taking or interfering with someone's property, and excluding a person without cause.

Unwanted or inappropriate behaviour includes:

• any behaviour that makes another person uncomfortable
• any demeaning words, actions or messages
• any sexually loaded words, actions or messages
• any intimidating, threatening or harmful physical behaviour

This applies equally to the behaviour of students, staff, and volunteers or parents.

If you are being bullied — or you see it happening

Report it. School leaders cannot resolve what they do not know about. Tell a staff member, in person or by message. If reporting it does not stop the behaviour, take it to the Associate Principal: Secondary.

1. Those involved will be interviewed, along with any witnesses.
2. If substantiated, the parents of both parties will be informed.
3. A restorative meeting will be arranged with the students involved, to restore the relationship and decide any further consequences.
4. If bullying continues, parents will be required to meet with Senior Leaders at school.
5. Further incidents could lead to stand-down or suspension.

Relationships with other students

Renew School aims to be a place where every student can build and enjoy good relationships. As you get older those relationships get more complex, and part of our job is to protect students from undue peer pressure and expectation around relationships.

We want an environment where young men and young women learn to respect each other and form lasting, meaningful friendships — where you feel free to relate to each other as friends and colleagues, and to care for one another, regardless of gender. With that in mind:

• Conversation of a sexually explicit or racially insensitive nature is not acceptable. That includes innuendo, jokes and language, and it includes online activity in and out of school.
• Greetings that show physical affection should be gender- and culturally sensitive. Physical affection towards members of the opposite sex, other than family, is easily misconstrued.
• Physical contact is limited to curriculum activities under adult supervision.
• There is to be no pairing off or separating from the group, except under teacher supervision for curriculum activities.
• The school does not support students forming boyfriend and girlfriend relationships, at school or socially.
• Older students are to respect and care for younger students, who should not have to overhear conversation appropriate only to older students.

Part of raising a generation who bear the image of God and make a Kingdom difference is teaching you to navigate the digital world — with a clear view of both its strengths and its weaknesses.

Devices genuinely enhance learning, and staff will use them to teach, to set work and to run assessment. But it is worth naming the limits:

• The device and the internet cannot think for you. You still have to learn how to think, how to recognise a good idea, and how not to be bounded by whatever a search or a model hands you.
• Not everything on the internet is true. Plenty of it is “truth” delivered by an algorithm.

Your iPad

Secondary students work on iPads. The school issues your iPad and it stays at school — you do not take it home. The care of it while it is in your hands is your responsibility.

• Treat it as you would a personal possession. This is stewardship.
• Put your iPad on charge when you leave school each day, so that it is fully charged and ready the next morning. Arriving to a flat iPad is your responsibility, not your teacher's.
• When devices come to class, they stay closed until the teacher directs otherwise.
• Do not remove name labels. No stickers or graffiti.
• Use only your own device.
• Do not install external files or applications.
• Tell your teacher or the IT department straight away if there is a problem — do not work around it.

Damage

The school carries an insurance plan for its iPads. Whether a damaged iPad is replaced under that plan depends on the circumstances — in particular whether the damage was accidental or wilful. Accidents happen and are treated as accidents. Damage done deliberately or through carelessness is a different matter, and may carry a cost.

Filtering and supervision

All internet traffic is filtered, through both Linewize and N4L. Your iPad screen is also visible to your teacher through Apple Classroom during lessons.

This is not a secret and it is not a trap — you should know it, and work accordingly. Attempting to bypass the filtering, including by hot-spotting from a phone, will have consequences.

Google Workspace for Education

Renew School runs on Google Workspace for Education. Your school Google account gives you Gmail, Drive, Docs, Slides, Sheets, Forms and Classroom, at school and at home, for as long as you are enrolled here.

• Check Classroom and your school email at the start of each day for messages and notices from staff.
• Work is set, completed and handed in through your school account. Keep your files in Drive, not only on the device.
• Your school account is for school. Messaging features are not for personal chat.
• Everything you do in your school account is school property and may be reviewed by staff at any time.

Mobile phones

Phones are away for the whole school day. This mirrors the national expectation for New Zealand schools, and it is not negotiable.

• Phones are switched off and out of sight from the moment you arrive until you leave the school grounds.
• Earphones and earbuds are not to be worn during the school day, unless a staff member directs you to use them for learning.
• If you need to contact home during the day, come to the school office.

Wear your uniform correctly at all times — at school, travelling to and from school, and whenever you are representing Renew School.

All Renew School uniform items are purchased through Bethell's Uniforms, Whangārei — 09 438 6566, info@bethellsuniforms.co.nz. Only the plain black active shorts for PE are bought elsewhere.

Everyday uniform — Boys, Years 9 to 13

Everyday uniform — Girls, Years 9 to 13

The uniform is mix and match — combine any of the items above.

Shirts and blouses may be worn out with shorts, but must be tucked in when worn with the jumper.

A school sun hat with the logo is available and students are encouraged to wear one outside; it comes off in class. There is no longer a school beanie.

Footwear and socks

Shoes, sandals and socks are black only. This has not changed with the new uniform.

Hair, jewellery and appearance

• Hair is clean and tidy, in natural colours, without attention-seeking styles.
• If long hair is a health and safety risk — in PE, or a science practical — you may be asked to tie it back.
• Boys are to be cleanly shaven rather than growing facial hair.
• Make-up, if worn, is to look natural.
• No jewellery, except that female students may wear a single stud or sleeper in each ear. A wristwatch and a medic-alert bracelet are fine.
• Taonga from your whānau: cultural exceptions can be made — ask the Principal.
• Tattoos are discouraged. A visible tattoo means a meeting between you, your parents and the Principal to discuss covering it.
• Thermals or a short-sleeved t-shirt may be worn under the uniform, but must not be visible.

If you arrive out of uniform you may be sent to the school office to phone home, so that correct clothing can be brought in or you can be collected and returned once correctly dressed. This includes footwear.

PE and sports uniform

PE kit is required for physical education and for representing the school in sport.

Transition to the new uniform — Terms 3 and 4, 2026

The uniform was redesigned in 2025 as part of the Proprietor's rebrand of its ministries in anticipation of what God has in store for Renew Church. Completion was delayed when another Whangārei uniform provider went into liquidation and Bethell's unexpectedly took on several large schools.

While we wait for Bethell's to complete the new uniform, you may wear the items below if you cannot source the official item. Please do not purchase anything else without consulting the school first.

The school also holds a selection of second-hand uniform, free of charge. Contact the office to make an appointment and check whether there is anything in your size.

The full range

Renew School is building a year-round system of recognition, which culminates in the end-of-year awards ceremony rather than beginning and ending there. The point is to notice and honour, consistently and all year, the character and achievement we actually want students to aspire to.

What the awards are built on

Our awards framework is founded on Romans 12:1–2 — the passage that gives the school its name and its motto. Recognition at Renew is not simply about who came top. It is about lives offered to God, minds being renewed, and the character that results.

I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:1–2 (ESV)

How awards will work

• Recognition runs through the year — in class, in assembly, in chapel and in rākau — not only at prize-giving.
• Published criteria exist for every cup and award. You are entitled to know what an award is for and what it takes to win it, before it is awarded.
• Awards connect to the character qualities set out in Colossians 3:12–17, to year-level and subject achievement, and to service and contribution.
• The Awards Committee is developing the detail through 2026, for full launch from the start of 2027.

The full list of cups and awards, with the criteria for each, will be published separately once the Awards Committee has completed its work.

Eating at interval and lunch

There are designated form rooms inside and picnic tables and seating outside. You may take food outside to eat, on the understanding that:

• there is no eating anywhere inside the buildings, or on the way out of them
• rubbish goes in the bins, or home in your lunch box or bag
• excess food is not fed to the birds
• food is not eaten while running or moving about

The same applies at interval. In wet or severe weather, students eat in form rooms at the start of lunch and remain inside, using those classrooms.

Private vehicles

Senior students who hold a driver's licence may drive to school. For everyone's safety:

• get permission from the Associate Principal: Secondary first, with signed parental consent
• drive slowly and safely in the school grounds
• do not carry unauthorised passengers to or from school
• remember that parking on site is a privilege, not a right

After-school work

Part-time work can be good for you. It should not interfere with your school requirements or your study. This matters most in the lead-up to external exams — give your employer plenty of notice of the time you need to prepare.

Evacuation

1. In an emergency such as fire, the alarm is sounded. Your teacher decides what immediate action is needed.
2. Leave the classroom quickly and in an orderly way. Leave all books and gear behind.
3. Use the nearest safe stairs and exit route, as posted in your classroom.
4. Go to the assembly area on the concrete courts.
5. Assemble in form lines by year level, with Year 9 at the front.
6. Your form teacher, or their delegate, will call the roll.
7. Stay on the concrete courts until the marshal gives the all-clear.

Earthquake

1. Drop, take cover under a desk or table, and hold onto the legs until the shaking stops.
2. Keep away from shelves with heavy objects and from large furniture.
3. Keep away from windows.
4. Stay indoors until the shaking stops and you are told to move to your class assembly area.

Lockdown

1. The lockdown alarm is short, successive bells.
2. Your teacher will move you to the far side of the classroom, away from windows and doors. If you are outside or in the toilets, get to the nearest secure room immediately.
3. Your teacher will lock the door and, if possible, close the blinds.
4. Your teacher will supervise moving furniture to create a barrier away from windows.
5. Stay in the secure position until the all-clear sounds — one long continuous bell. Do not evacuate unless the fire alarm sounds.

Contact

And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Colossians 3:17 (ESV)