Constable Nayland Smith issued a speeding ticket on average every 12 minutes during an intermittent three-week period monitoring motorists driving past Omarama School.
But he believes the true number of such incidents in the Waitaki Valley to be significantly higher.
"I recently issued 38 tickets within a three-week period, but, due to other commitments, I have not always been able to be there every day," he said.
There is a 50kmh speed limit outside the school, which is some distance from the SH8 70kmh zone on the Lindis Pass side of Omarama.
Const Smith, of Omarama, estimated he had patrolled the area for about seven and a-half hours in total, meaning the average time between stopping vehicles to issue tickets to be about 12 minutes.
He added that not one of the tickets had been issued to a resident of Omarama or Otematata.
Const Smith believed the issue of speeding near schools was an important one.
The average motorist travelling at 50kmh who identified a hazard on the road would travel nearly 20 metres before their foot touched the brake pedal, he said.
That meant a child spotted on the road 20 metres away from a vehicle travelling at that speed would be struck at 50kmh, he said.
"A healthy adult struck by a car doing 50kmh has a 40% chance of survival - for a child a lot less. The highest speed I clocked last week was 87kmh," he said.
He commended the people of Otematata and Omarama for their diligence and urged them to continue to monitor their speed near schools, and to note and then report the registration plates of speeding vehicles.
He implored people to consider bus routes and issued a reminder of the 20kmh restriction that applies to vehicles passing stationary school buses.
The latest statistics showed more than 1200 children nationwide had been killed or injured on roads near schools during school terms over the last five years, he said.
Some progress had been made in his push for road signs warning of nearby schools, and the New Zealand Transport Agency planned to complete surveys in the area to that effect, he said.
Southern Highway Patrol Acting Senior Sergeant Pete Muldrew said fines for speeding past schools were the same as those for any other road - graduated for how many kilometres over the limit a motorist travelled.
Acting Snr Sgt Muldrew said 133 children aged between 4 and 18 had received serious (24) or minor injuries (109) within 250m of the school zone during school terms on the roads in the Southern district since 2005, with drivers aged between 15 and 19 ruled to be at fault in 48% of instances.
The key risk times are between 7.30am and 9am and 2.30pm to 4pm during weekdays, he said.
Police ran a co-ordinated back-to-school operation during the first two weeks of the school term which included the monitoring of school bus routes.
It is to be followed up with visits to schools where year 12 and 13 pupils will have the opportunity to speak with police.
Acting Snr Sgt Muldrew said the proactive policing had proven effective with marked patrol cars being a common sight outside many schools during the two-week period.
The higher visibility of the patrol cars deployed served as a preventive measure rather than just concentrating on apprehensions, he said.
