Home Educators & the Ministry (COVID-19 Lockdown)

Many folk are asking questions about what happens with exemption applications, and declarations during this shut down period. I've emailed all regional offices, and received feedback from each one. The national office has also put a brief update on their Home Education webpages. Here's what you need to know:

Note: for an update as of 4th May and 19th May on the payment of the Supervision Allowance due this month, see updates at the end of this article.

Ministry employees are working from home

All regional Ministry staff are working from home. They will be able to process exemption applications received via email (ie electronically), but not those that are sent by post, as they cannot access the mail until after the shutdown. 

As doing it this way is new to most of them, they are unsure about whether timeframes for processing will be affected. However I've had a number of reports back from families who have submitted applications during lockdown so far that they have been approved very swiftly. 

Regional staff will contact families to let them know that their application has been approved. At this point some regional offices are saying they will email the exemption certificate to families, others are saying they will have to wait until they are back in the office to access printers and will post them out. Some plan to do both.

This is the wording that the Ministry has added to their website on 2nd April:
"The Covid-19 lockdown has restricted how we process home-school applications and declarations. However, we will do our best to ensure no family who wishes to formally home-school their child, or children, is disadvantaged.
As our staff are having to work from home, local offices will only be able to process emailed applications.
If your application is approved you will receive your certificate of exemption by email.
If you have any queries please contact your local Ministry office."

Six monthly declarations and allowances

The April declarations were mailed out before lockdown. Families are starting to receive them now. I have today (Monday 30th) spoken to Resourcing Division and here is the situation and advice:

The lovely staff member I spoke to, who like everyone was taken by surprise by the announcement of impending lockdown, hastily printed off all declarations, took them home with him, and personally stuffed envelopes and sent them out, so families would get them (big ups to Kenneth!)

He advises me that while families can send the declarations back, they have no way of processing them, regardles of whether they are posted or emailed. This is because the system they are working with is complex and antiquated, partly paper based, and significant parts cannot be done remotely. IF the lockdown ends of schedule, they hope to make the payment as intended in the week starting May 18th, but if it is extended, it may be June or so before payments can be made. 

Some families have already contacted the Ministry and emailed their forms. That is fine. HOWEVER, it would be much more helpful if the bulk of forms were posted to the Ministry, so they can work through them systematically as soon as they are able. 

We discussed various aspects, and the following are important recommendations:

Important advice:

1) If you can, please post your declarations back. BEFORE you do this, take a scan or clear picture of it as a back up so that if there are issues later, you can then email that back up copy to them. But if you're one of the efficient ones who already sent it back in without keeping a copy, then don't worry about it; if later it turns out we need to submit electronically then at that time you can ask for a new copy to be emailed to you. 
Note: this time around, for the first time ever, students NSNs are included in the declarations. You are going to want a copy so you have that info for the future too. See THIS for more. 

2) If you have no access to mail services at this time and/or have not received your declaration in a reasonable period of time (say the end of this week), then you can email resourcing@education.govt.nz and ask for a copy to be sent to you electronically. They do have the capacity to send them out by email on request, but not to reprint any at this time. Please give it a bit of time first though - post is likely to be slow currently.

3) If you cannot access postal services to return your declaration, then you can also email the completed return to resourcing@education.govt.nz. But again, only do this if you cannot post, as if we overwhelm their inbox, mistakes are more likely to be made than if they're working through a physical pile of paper in due course.

Further wording the Ministry have added to their website re allowances on 2nd April:
"As stated, the Covid-19 lockdown has restricted how we process applications and declarations.
The date when declarations are due and allowances paid may be subject to change. We will seek to provide further advice over the coming weeks.
If you have any questions you can contact resourcing support at: resourcing@education.govt.nz"

And for anyone looking for the postal address, it's:
Resourcing Division
Ministry of Education
PO Box 1666
​Wellington 6140

Conclusion:

During these difficult and unprecedented times everyone is doing the best that they can, but disruptions are unavoidable. Let's be patient and kind to ourselves and each other. 

• Exemption applications can still be sent into regional Ministry offices, but should be emailed rather than posted, as only emailed applications can be processed at this time. ​
• Declarations can be signed and posted back in - they will be processed once lockdown ends, though if it is extended payment dates may be delayed. Emailing declarations will not speed up processing, and too many emailed declarations could cause issues and actually slow things down. Where needed, though, emailing is an option - see above for details.

May 4th Update on Supervison Allowance Payments:

​I phoned Resourcing today; the same diligent staff member who made sure declarations were sent out has had the boxes of received declarations delivered to his home, and is working on processing them. He will have another delivery in the next few days, to ensure that all declarations received by the cut-off date (last Friday, May 1st) are also processed. He has been working with the payments team and they believe they have come up with a way to ensure that payments can be processed remotely. At this time, therefore, they hope that all payments related to declarations received on time will be made on schedule, in the week of 18-22nd May. Note that this is an untested way of doing this, so they cannot yet guarantee success, but it is their intention to make it work.

Any declarations which were not received by the Ministry by the deadline will still be processed, but will have to wait until staff are able to return to the office; a date which is as yet unknown.

May 19th Update on Supervision Allowance Payments:

Today Resourcing confirmed that payments are being processed "as we speak" and everyone should have them by the end of the week. All declarations recieved by post or email by the May 1st cut off have been processed for payment.

Those who sent declarations in late can expect that they will be paid on a later cycle, as is usually the case. (The Ministry normally has payment cycles roughly every two weeks)

If you have not yet received a declaration, contact Resourcing at the email address above and ask for one to be emailed to you. 

If you think you've returned a declaration but are worried it has not been received or processed, you can call the Ministry to check. I suggest waiting to see if you get the payment this week first, so as to limit calls to just those who have not.