Celebrate, Collaborate, Create!
8th June Albany Senior High School
Mā whero, mā pango ka oti ai te mahi
With the red and the black the work will be complete
The whakatauki speaks to the power of collaboration, that in our combined efforts we will achieve our goals. This whakatauki speaks to the intention of our Whānau ki te Ako conference for 2021. This conference celebrated practice within and beyond Whānau ki te Ako, so that we can be empowered to always evolve to meet the needs of our learners. Our keynote speaker and other leaders through our day had expertise and vision that responds to our strategtic goals including local curriculum design, cultural sustainability and competence and our collective responsibility to uphold Te Tiriri o Waitangi.
The 2021 Whānau ki te Ako conference was an overwhelming success with over 85% of participants who provided post conference feedback rating the event either four or five out of five. Over 30% of these participants rated this event five out of five. We are humbled that the event was such a success for such a large number of people.
Laurayne Tafa spoke powerfully at the beginning of the day and through the day and in feedback it is clear her whakaaro (thoughts) resonated. She laid down the wero for us all to improve the way we work to ensure our practice is culturally sustainable for all learners. We have planned to work with her as a Kāhui Ako further, so it's not the last we will hear from Laurayne!
By in large the workshops from external providers and within school leaders were a success. We would like to thank all of those involved in these presentations who contributed to the day being as fabulous as it was.
There were 350 participants on the day and the buzz was palpable. People enjoyed the opportunity to connect with colleagues in other settings. There is room to make this a greater focus in further conferences with 50% of participants saying they connected meaningfully with someone outside their setting.
We are thrilled with the outcomes of the day and certainly achieved our goals to celebrate, collaborate and create. We are also always keen to evolve and improve and look forward to delivering an even better than before conference next time around. Stay tuned!
Keynote Speaker
Pouli Laurayne Taulaete Nuanua Tafa
Laurayne brings a wide range of teaching, instructional leadership, pedagogical coaching, advisory and evaluation experiences to her Tafa_Ed_Ltd education consultancy and professional learning services.
As a previous school principal and Board chair of a Co-Governance School she has led four communities through significant change management for positive improvements.
Laurayne's expertise is in leading schooling improvement at individual, Kahui Ako and network clusters levels, through confronting dominant discourses at play and supporting leaders to challenge the failing status quo and bringing about excellence and equity.
Laurayne operates with an accurate awareness of the role and status that whanau, hapu and iwi need to be given in learning partnerships and supports education sites to better understand what is required in these partnerships to serve and achieve the community’s aspirations for their young people.
Over 5 years Laurayne had the privilege of working alongside Emeritus Professor Russell Bishop leading the Relationship Based Learning approach both locally and internationally – this learning has enables her to become expert in respectful and safely supporting people through critical consciousness and eliminating the effects of racism, deficit theorising and low expectations.