New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 List of islands of New Zealand, smaller islands. It is the ...

, a state-integrated school is a former private school which has integrated into the state education system under the Private Schools Conditional Integration Act 1975, becoming a state school while retaining its special character. State-integrated schools were established by the Third Labour Government in the early 1970s as a response to the near-collapse of the country's then private

Catholic school Catholic schools are pre-primary, primary and secondary educational institutions administered under the aegis or in association with the Catholic Church. , the Catholic Church operates the world's largest religious, non-governmental school syst ...

system, which had run into financial difficulties. As of July 2016, there were 329 state-integrated schools in New Zealand, of which 237 identify as

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

. They educate approximately 87,500 students, or 11.5% of New Zealand's student population, making them the second-most common type of school in New Zealand behind non-integrated state schools.

History

New Zealand's state education system was established in 1877. Prior to then, schools were run by church groups and other private groups. From 1852 until provinces were abolished in 1876, all schools were entitled to receive some financial assistance from provincial governments. Under the

Education Act 1877 The Education Act 1877 established twelve regional Education Boards in New Zealand after the provinces were abolished and the central government took control of education. The act established that education would be free, compulsory, and secul ...

, education became compulsory for all children between 7 and 13 years of age and gave all children between 5 and 15 years of age the entitlement to free and secular education in a state-run school. The secular-education requirement arose from a deadlock between secularist, Catholic, and Protestant MPs over how much and what type of religious influence (if any) shoul