On Friday 25^th February, Minister Hipkins announced vaccine passes for school related activities would no longer be necessary. The Ministry of Education announced further detail in relation to this on March 1st:

“As indicated by Minister Hipkins, all children and young people will soon be able to participate in all school-organised teams and groups regardless of their vaccination status.  An amendment to the Health Order will now be needed and we anticipate these changes will take effect no later than Tuesday 15 March.  This will apply to onsite and offsite activities for both curriculum-related (including offsite education outside the classroom) and extra-curricular activities offered by a registered school.  This change will apply to intra-school and inter-school competitions/activities as well as competitions/activities where school teams/groups compete against other teams/groups which are not from a school. For example, the school’s First XI competing in a local senior club competition or the school kapa haka group competing against adult groups in a regional competition.  We will advise you when these changes to the Health Order occur and will update our website information to reflect the above information and advice at that time.  For now, the existing requirements/permissions under the Health Order remain in place.”

The full update from the MOE is here

• These changes will apply to all venues, including council venues, that are used for school organised activities and require a Vaccine Pass. 
• The change means that for these venues, Vaccine Pass requirements will no longer apply for those participating in school-related activities (curricular or extracurricular). Students will be ‘exempt’ from vaccine pass requirements and there will be no requirement for facilities to partition off space for these groups.
• Students who are in a school-organised team, group or individual activity cannot be asked for a vaccine pass and must be treated by the activity organiser or venue operator as if they were vaccinated.
• For council venues that have chosen to not apply a Vaccine Pass setting or have chosen not to host EOTC activities, there is no change.
• A reminder that at Red, these activities will still be able to have up to 100 participants in a defined space, so long as the adult participants have a My Vaccine Pass.
• There is no change to the vaccine requirements for staff and volunteers supporting any school activity involving children and young people – they must be vaccinated and may be asked by venue staff to provide evidence of their vaccination.
• Reasonably practical steps should be taken by event organisers with scheduled events post 15^th March that allow for all students to be eligible to participate.
• Schools should begin to plan now for the incorporation of all students to be eligible to participate in all school sport activities from the 15^th March.

School Sport NZ and regional school sport offices will continue to monitor the updated guidance and work closely with member schools, councils, and sports bodies to interpret and implement these changes.  For clarity and in line with guidance from the Ministry of Education, School Sport NZ existing policies are to remain in place until the Health Order has been updated and we have received guidance from Sport NZ and Ministry of Education. If you have any specific questions you would like answered please contact Covid19response@sportnz.org.nz or contact us at School Sport NZ.

Article added: Thursday 03 March 2022