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Western Springs College
High School · State · Auckland
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DO NOT GO TO SPRINGS
This school honestly is kinda bad, the periods are WAY to long, the teachers are WAY to obnoxious, they don't let us do anything fun, they are like vampire except they suck the fun of you instead of blood. 0/1,000 bad school tbh
Poor teaching standards
Teachers are lazy and do not actually want to teach students anything. An open plan learning environment does not work and was just a ploy for the school to get more funding from the ministry of education
horrible response to sexual assault
the staff blackmailed me by threatening to take away my disability aid if i reported another student to the police. I spent two years trying and eventually being forced to drop out because they continued to put my rapist in my classes and extra curriculars. Ive had to gaird a special needs student who was left alone and naked in a bathroom for over an hour untill their caretaker came back from their lunch break. The school itself is horribly designed, its loud theres no privacy and theres not enough seating. Classrooms are practically hallways due to the open plan building. Some classes are infront of the toilets with no separation and you cant even work because of the smell. Its impossible to write about all the issues with Western Springs College.
My experience in western springs auckland
My schools better than my old school, we get freedom of clothing not just that we dont have uniform but we get a very reasonable dresscode. Im a year 13 and we get lots of freedom like leaving school grounds during breaks or free periods and lots of great subject choices. The school is great for neurodivergent and lgbt kids like myself we get help during exams and our own rooms.
Year 11
Good environment
It really is a very good school.
Be very wary of this school
As a parent I would definitely not recommend this school. Kids like it, but for the wrong reasons. Pastoral care is very limited and it is not a safe environment.
Springs review
I started at Western Springs in 2016 and graduated in 2020. I was at the school when they had all the old buildings, as well as when they began the whole rebuild. Over the years as a Pacific Islander, I found the school a great school. Some would say teachers weren't good or whatever but all the teachers I had were probably some of the best that I've had.
I left WSC for one year and at my new school, it made me miss WSC. Springs just was different from other schools and that's what made me like it.
The school had crazy prices but they had things that made it better than others. No uniform for one, sure sometimes it felt like you had to dress well but it did bring out everyone's individuality.
As Pacific Islanders, they had ways of making life easier for us Pacific Islanders. Many of the teachers knew that it was harder for us PI students and did whatever they could to help us.
Although the indoor space in the new building was loud and sometimes distracting I'd rate it a 6/10.
Overall I'd say I loved WSC.
I left WSC for one year and at my new school, it made me miss WSC. Springs just was different from other schools and that's what made me like it.
The school had crazy prices but they had things that made it better than others. No uniform for one, sure sometimes it felt like you had to dress well but it did bring out everyone's individuality.
As Pacific Islanders, they had ways of making life easier for us Pacific Islanders. Many of the teachers knew that it was harder for us PI students and did whatever they could to help us.
Although the indoor space in the new building was loud and sometimes distracting I'd rate it a 6/10.
Overall I'd say I loved WSC.
Extremely inadequate.
The school is painfully inadequate. I graduated in 2019 when the new building opened. First of all the open plan of the new building was a mistake. It was the worse and apparently it was done to ‘increase’ learning - ‘it’s the new way of teaching.’ That is BS. The classes were noisy, almost all were not in enclosed spaces. Could hear movies being played etc.
The sports in the school was the absolute worst. I paid for a sport and I never got to play and never got a refund when they said they would get back to me. Never got a response back from certain teachers when writing them a email specifically teachers in charge of the sports centre.
The school is also really sneaky with their pricing as they don’t put all sport costs up front. Ended up paying $90 for a uniform top on top of the sport fees just to return it at the end of the season (which lasted like 4 weeks btw)
Not sure about the arts but it’s definitely more of a hippie artsy school where the outcasts smoked pot during break times. There’s TAPAC so I suppose could be good for wannabe dancers and actors.
The teachers are mediocre, had some painfully bad atrocious ones but I had about two who were good. Love my year 12 chemistry teacher, she made me love it. Some teachers just don’t know how to teach - there was one teacher who had a masters degree but barely spoke proper English and no one could understand her. She didn’t even try to teach just told us to read the textbook. Made me flunk physics :)
This school also loved to ask parents all the time for their ‘compulsory donations’ when public high school in NZ is free. Kept pestering my parent to pay the donations when it’s legally optional. Would have been fine if it was a good school but WSC was bad.
Academics: some of the teachers only cared about the people who were failing giving chances upon chances while leaving the students who actually wanted to get good grades in the dust. Some teachers were totally unfair on the NCEA grading process and let failing students many extensions on the due date for assignments. Whereas I asked one of my teachers do give me feedback on a report 2 weeks before the due date and she says sure but never gets to it :). Then I get my barely passing friend telling me that the teacher was spending her evening helping him on his report way past the due day by herself 🥰
The school really does the bare minimum on academics and everything basically.
The graduation was actually terrible in 2019. Our graduation certificate wasn’t even a certificate, it was a small piece of A5 paper written in comic sans font with no colour and a few words. Hey at least Jacinda Ardern shook my hand.
The good:
There will be some good teachers who truely care and want you to learn. The school is quite relaxed about everything - hey I mean it’s a school without a uniform. The cafeteria food is nice but expensive. There’s lots of land to play your own recreational sports.
Meant to give this 2 stars.
The sports in the school was the absolute worst. I paid for a sport and I never got to play and never got a refund when they said they would get back to me. Never got a response back from certain teachers when writing them a email specifically teachers in charge of the sports centre.
The school is also really sneaky with their pricing as they don’t put all sport costs up front. Ended up paying $90 for a uniform top on top of the sport fees just to return it at the end of the season (which lasted like 4 weeks btw)
Not sure about the arts but it’s definitely more of a hippie artsy school where the outcasts smoked pot during break times. There’s TAPAC so I suppose could be good for wannabe dancers and actors.
The teachers are mediocre, had some painfully bad atrocious ones but I had about two who were good. Love my year 12 chemistry teacher, she made me love it. Some teachers just don’t know how to teach - there was one teacher who had a masters degree but barely spoke proper English and no one could understand her. She didn’t even try to teach just told us to read the textbook. Made me flunk physics :)
This school also loved to ask parents all the time for their ‘compulsory donations’ when public high school in NZ is free. Kept pestering my parent to pay the donations when it’s legally optional. Would have been fine if it was a good school but WSC was bad.
Academics: some of the teachers only cared about the people who were failing giving chances upon chances while leaving the students who actually wanted to get good grades in the dust. Some teachers were totally unfair on the NCEA grading process and let failing students many extensions on the due date for assignments. Whereas I asked one of my teachers do give me feedback on a report 2 weeks before the due date and she says sure but never gets to it :). Then I get my barely passing friend telling me that the teacher was spending her evening helping him on his report way past the due day by herself 🥰
The school really does the bare minimum on academics and everything basically.
The graduation was actually terrible in 2019. Our graduation certificate wasn’t even a certificate, it was a small piece of A5 paper written in comic sans font with no colour and a few words. Hey at least Jacinda Ardern shook my hand.
The good:
There will be some good teachers who truely care and want you to learn. The school is quite relaxed about everything - hey I mean it’s a school without a uniform. The cafeteria food is nice but expensive. There’s lots of land to play your own recreational sports.
Meant to give this 2 stars.
very average school
it’s been 2 years since i left this school but i can agree that the open learning environment was the worst thing to ever happen to this school, it’s super distracting, messy and you can never even hear anything going on in your own class. we were only in the open building for my last year there but i probably learnt the least that year in all the years i was there. also don’t ask teachers for help they never really do and if you’re being bullied also don’t bother asking for any help it’s a waste of time, they won’t even do anything about it.
average school 👍
i haven’t been at this school for two years now but i can assure you the open plan learning thing was the worst thing that ever happened to this school, you can never hear anything, it’s messy and so distracting. if anything it just made learning harder. also don’t ask any teachers for help cause they pretty much don’t and especially don’t ask for help if you’re being bullied it’s a waste of your time
Yikes
The school is mediocre at best. The open learning environment sucks because the school population is too big and we can barely hear what’s going on. 50% of the time teachers are gone to other spaces to tell them to be quiet. Bullying happens like crazy and very little is done about it. The Springs Principal has no backbone and can be quite racist or discriminative to the bilingual side, constantly not adhering to the cultural aspects of the school despite promoting co-governance. Overall the education is okay, i passed my first NCEA run so that’s something. And the schools policies are so outdated that when i asked for a review of some obviously in favour of teachers, i wasn’t given a response.
Worst school to attend
Would not recommend children to this school. The school is well known for students giving teachers a hard time, bullying (like most schools) with bullies not been punished, and the open learning is a nightmare for most students as the school's population is too big. The principal is very weak and has no confidence in sorting out the current issues within unhappy staff, bullying and also unhappy parents.
Bad for conservatives better for hippie/activists
Overall a pretty good school but definitely has a huge political bias created by the teachers and students. If your not a green of labour fan you’ll have to face some bullying. I think if your more on the conservative side when it comes to politics don’t send ya kids here as there opinions won’t be accepted or tolerated with respect by students. Definitely an alternative school with a lot of alternative kids. I’d say if your a big drug fan this is your school!
Hippy’s only
Huge political bias, if u don’t like labour or green your dead ...
Springs is horrible
The periods are way to long and the teachers their are so mean and bullying goes on as if it’s nothing it’s so shit at springs 0/100 the open learning sucks. Horrible sports fields I can’t even join a rugby team for my age level
its okay
too many people for one building but algds if you ignore the scodie stuff that goes on. the subjects are good and teachers are okay and really do try there best with the change but the modern learning environment feels like it kinda gets rid of their purpose altogether since we do everything through google classroom. Also its always dirty because we dont actually have classrooms so we just have to eat anywhere we can find space. Ive seen some classes just be basically in front of the bathrooms with a rolled out tv. Other than the building all the resources and equipment we have are great.
its okay
too many people for one building but its algd ig if u ignore the scodie stuff
Overall Good
Good school and no uniform, very different lay out to other schools
School
Good teachers but you may not like the modern learning environment
Motions Road, 1022, Auckland
Ivan Davis
09 815 6730
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