Rutherford College is a co-educational state secondary school on the Te Atatu Peninsula, Auckland, New Zealand. Rutherford College (formerly named Rutherford High School) is a New Zealand Qualifications Authority accredited co-educational Year 9-13 State Secondary school, established in 1961. Named after the New Zealand-born nuclear physicist and chemist Lord Ernest Rutherford. It caters for students from year 9 to year 13, as well as providing adult education, special education and night courses. It offers well-qualified, professional staff are very successful in challenging students to achieve academic success in national assessments. The College encourages student participation in a wide range of extra curricular activities, again challenging students to reach their full potential in all areas. The Kaleidoscope Programme is for students who are gifted and/or talented and subjects. It program is an alternative to mainstream courses at Rutherford College. Rutherford is one of only a handful of schools in New Zealand to have been granted $300,000 under the Ministry of Education's Talent Development Initiative (TDI).