The Ministry of Education has come under fire for its handling of the King's High School roll cap dispute, and has been accused of being more concerned about winning and being right, than about good outcomes.
The King's High School board of trustees last week agreed to introduce an enrolment scheme, which meant its roll would be capped at 1035 pupils.
However, a senior board of trustees member from another Dunedin secondary school, who wished to remain anonymous, was critical of the ministry for penalising King's for its success.
''I think the ministry has got it completely around the wrong way.
''The ministry needs to look at the reason why other high schools are failing to attract students, and work with those schools to address those issues.
''If you've got high schools which aren't appealing to students and parents, then you need to actively work with those high schools to find out why, and to fix it.''
He believed not all schools were equal in the minds of some parents.
''If they are not equal in the minds of parents, you need to fix whatever those issues are _ whether they be perception or substantial.''
He said he took his hat off to any pupil who wanted to travel across town in a Dunedin winter for what they perceived was a better education.
''I don't think that anyone should stop someone being able to do that.
''Having said that, they shouldn't feel the need to travel across town for a better education.
''The school is obviously not providing them with something they want - whether that be cultural, sporting, how they feel in the schoolyard, or whether it be academic.
''There's obviously something missing from what the parents and kids' expectations are about the other schools. That's why they're electing to go across town.
''It seems to me the ministry is more concerned with winning and being right than they are with good outcomes.''
Ministry of Education enablement and support sector head Katrina Casey said the issue that challenged all Dunedin secondary schools was a declining school age population in the city.
''That's meant there is a great deal of excess classroom space across the city.
''As of March 2015, there were around 1500 surplus spaces across all 12 Dunedin secondary schools.
''It wouldn't be sensible to encourage one school, that is already full, to continue growing in an unconstrained way, when there is already spare space elsewhere.
''In time, this would have meant building more classrooms at King's.
''That just doesn't make sense when education funding is limited.''
Dunedin could be proud that its schools were delivering strong academic results for its pupils, Ms Casey said.
In 2014, Dunedin school leavers had an 82.3% rate of achieving NCEA level 2, well above the national average of 77.1%, she said.
''Our role is to continue to support Dunedin schools to deliver that high quality of education.
''We're working with local secondary schools on how they jointly want to tackle the issue of declining rolls, so that students can continue to have access to quality education and broad curriculum options.''
