Homeschooling New Zealand is charitable Christian trust set up to support and encourage home educators.

Our current principal is Todd Roughton, and together with his wife Riety, they run the office which is located in Whangarei.

Todd was educated in Whangarei and attended North Shore Teachers' College. He taught in Auckland, Bay of Islands and Whangarei before heading overseas for a period of twelve years. Nine of these were in Belgium, where he taught English as a Second Language, and worked closely with Youth With a Mission. It was in Belgium that he met and married Riety, a Dutch trained teacher of languages who at the time was teaching French to Operation Mobilisation missions teams. They returned to New Zealand in 1989 where Todd got involved in Christian education, first at KingsWay School in Orewa, and then later as principal of Living Way Learning Centre in Wellsford.   

In 1999 they took their four young children back to Europe to spend a year living in Holland in the same village as “Oma and Opa”. During this period, Todd homeschooled the four children while Riety returned to her former high school as a teacher of French and Dutch. Upon returning to New Zealand, Todd worked as a supervisor in an ACE school at Maungaturoto before the family moved to Whangarei  in 2002 and began homeschooling fulltime. To fund this lifestyle choice, they have been running their run their own educational business from home.

Todd has worked on Tertiary Education Commission contracts assisting school leavers who lack the Literacy and Numeracy skills to obtain their trade qualifications, as well as writing and publishing a weekly Literacy resource for school in Australia, New Zealand and Canada. In between the homeschooling and homemaking, Riety gives French, Dutch and German lessons to groups and individuals.

Their three oldest children Emily (23), Amy (20) and Anna (18) have all graduated with an ACE Yr 13 Academic Certificate. Emily is furthering her music studies while working as a legal secretary, Amy is in her third year of a nursing degree, and Anna is her second year of a teaching degree at Bethlehem Tertiary Institute. Thijs (16) is currently working through his ACE programme at a Yr 13 level.  

Todd was on the HSNZ Board for a number of years before taking over his current position. He has a passion to see parents assisted as they take responsibility for the education of their own children, and sees the role of HSNZ as being very much that of a servant to families to help them in this task.

L to R: Thijs (16), Todd, Emily (23), Riety, Anna (18) Amy (20)