Education Qualifications are one of the most important indicators of socio-economic status. With other data sources, such as Income statistics and Occupation data, Wairoa District's Education Qualifications help to evaluate the economic opportunities and socio-economic status of an area and identify skill gaps in the labour market. Level of Educational Qualifications in a population relate to a number of factors including:

• The age of the population (e.g. older people tend to have more vocational qualifications, while people in their twenties and thirties are more likely to have a university degree);
• The professional or working ambitions of people (to seek education as youth or retraining as adults);
• The opportunities afforded to people to continue studying beyond compulsory schooling; and
• Immigration policy

Please note: Stats NZ has given Qualifications data for the 2018 Census a quality rating of "moderate". This indicates there may be some minor issues looking at the comparisons to 2013 and 2006. Users should avoid concluding that any change in the categories is purely due to real world change. See Stats NZ’s DataInfo+ for specific information on what this rating means and recommendations for use.