After more than four years of campaigning, Dunedin Rudolf Steiner School has been granted permission to significantly increase its roll to match the high demand for enrolments.
Principal Pene Johnstone said the primary school at Maia had 56 pupils and was formerly restricted to 60 pupils.
The increase would now allow the school to cater for up to 96. The school would be able to increase its number of pupils per year to 12.
She said it would meet immediate demand for Steiner education to a growing number of families seeking the child-centred, holistic approach that the system offered.
"Our school celebrates and protects childhood and offers a rich, playful, artistic education, embracing our bicultural heritage, as well as ensuring that pupils leave ready for secondary school.
"The cap increase, granted by the Ministry of Education, is a big step for the school and they are delighted with the outcome.
"We have many families who live here and seek this education, and we’ve even seen people moving to the area, just so they can enrol their children here, especially since Covid-19."
Families at the school came from all over the wider Dunedin area, she said.
Many of the children entering the school came through the three kindergarten rooms on the site which catered for up to 45 children, from the age of 3.
She said it had taken more than four years to have the roll increase approved because the school had to show the ministry it had waiting families who wanted Steiner’s special character education, that could not be gained from other local schools.
A building programme to build two new classrooms was planned for later this year.
She said the roll increase was not expected to affect other local schools.
They had been "mostly supportive" of the application because the Steiner school was categorised as a "special character" school and was different from mainstream schools.
