Being Maori, Being successful

Māori students who learn within their own cultural context are more likely to succeed. Heeni Collins investigates

Key points
- An independent review panel set up by the government recommended in April that a minister for the Māori language be appointed to prevent the language dying out. The government is yet to announce its response.
- Māori students are disproportionally represented in students who are not achieving NCEA level 2. Research indicates Māori students do better when taught in a Māori cultural context.
- Te Kura o Otari in Wellington provides three stands of education – Māori immersion, Montessori, and English medium – and some hugely successful students.

Tihema Rewa Nicol knows that when she becomes qualified as a dentist she will eventually want to share her skills with her hapū and iwi.
Tihema of Ngati Tūwharetoa, 21, is studying for a Bachelor of Dental Surgery at Otago. When she graduates, she initially wants to work part-time in a hospital and part-time in a private practice.
Her long-term dream, however, is to set up a private practice in her tribal rohe to provide a cheaper service, predominantly for Māori.
While she knows this dream may not be the highest paying option, her up-bringing through Māori immersion schooling has embedded principles of service to her people deep in her heart.
While the most important thing about Māori immersion schooling is the continuation of te reo, says Tihema’s mother Tania Loughlin, the second most important thing is that the children love going to school. “It’s not a hard job, it’s something that they love.”
Whānaungatanga
Tania and her husband Reece Nicol believe strongly that their children have a right to an education which reflects their Tūwharetoa (Ngāti Ruingarangi, Ngāti Rauhoto) whakapapa. After attending kōhanga reo, both their children went to Te Kura o Otari in Wellington, which has had a Māori language immersion strand since 1995. This school also has mainstream and Montessori strands.
The strongest value which unites the three strands at the school is whānaungatanga, says principal Clifford Wicks. Every week begins with karakia and waiata at school-wide assemblies and all three strands combine for planning and other hui.
Including all three strands at the school has turned it around from a school which was struggling to survive with 50 pupils in 1993, to one which has grown to 230 pupils with whānau coming from as far away as Upper Hutt to attend the Māori strand. All three strands have grown equally fast, and while parents have different priorities, most see all three as offering strengths.
Other aspects that add to the school’s appeal are its multi-year classes; its teaching of “virtues” or values school-wide; and its strong environmental kaupapa, due to its proximity to the neighbouring Otari-Wilton bush reserve.
English in Year 7
“Our commitment to the whole child is authentic, and while it doesn’t suit all children, we’ve had a number of children with behavioural issues with whom we seem to have had considerable success. The whānau environment across the school seems to benefit some kids,” says Clifford.
His comments back numerous studies that show indigenous students do better when taught within their own cultural context.
The Māori immersion strand at Otari continues to Year 8, and includes an English language component in the final two years. While no formal data about outcomes for the children beyond immersion has been collected - “anecdotally I’ve been quite encouraged,” says Mr Wicks. Many have excelled after going on to various secondary schools, including Māori boarding schools such as Te Aute and Hato Hohepa (St Joseph’s Māori Girls’ College inTaradale).
Literacy and numeracy
Some have done really well even in English, though the first six months of transition can be challenging. ‘There are some areas where they’ve been behind, but they catch up quickly,” says Clifford.
The school recognized early on that there was a need to ensure literacy and numeracy skills were being sufficiently advanced in the immersion strand, and so one of the kaiako completed a management unit on that topic.
Ngā Whānaketanga, the Māori immersion National Standards, recognize the primary importance of listening and speaking in relation to survival of te reo, but also acknowledge the need to read and write which follows. Kaiako at Te Kura o Otari have so far found Ngā Whānaketanga to be useful benchmarks.
The  happy atmosphere at Te Kura o Otari is reflected in the consistency of staff – fluent Tuhoe speaker Whaea Lynette Franklin has worked at the kura for 15 years – first as a kaiārahi i te reo, and then through study becoming a qualified teacher and continuing to work there as a kaiako.
Staff prefer the tamariki to remain through to year eight to be confident that they have fully grasped the language, and believe that by then they are confident learners, well grounded in their own whakapapa and culture. “They are self-motivated and have strategies for their own learning,” says Tania Panepasa, NZEI representative for the kura.
‘I can do that’
Tihema Rewa Nicol is surely an example of that. The family moved to Australia when Tihema was 12, after she had spent ten years in immersion Māori schooling. While her phonetic spelling of English may have raised eyebrows at first, she soon started making bigger waves by her independence of thought and ability to debate issues from an indigenous perspective.
While the rest of the class strongly opposed the killing of whales, she talked about how they are an essential food source for the indigenous people of Alaska.  She continued with te reo through the Correspondence School, and in 2002 was awarded a prize for outstanding Māori language work by a senior student.
After returning to Aotearoa with her family, she got a full-time job as a dental assistant and observed the work of the dentist close-hand. “I can do that,” she decided. She began studying Health Science at Otago University and while unsuccessful on her first attempt to get into dentistry, she remained for a second year studying micro-biology and tried again. This time she succeeded and has received a scholarship grant from a Ngati Tūwharetoa charitable trust towards her study.
A vision
As well as the survival of the reo and cultural knowledge, another key aspect of kaupapa Māori education, according to Rawiri Wright who leads Te Runanga Nui o Nga Kura Kaupapa Māori (the national body of kura kaupapa), is about empowerment - Māori having the right to raise their tamariki to see the world through Māori eyes, with the same rights as any other citizen of the world.
“He who names the world, owns the world. If we continue to allow Pakeha to name it, they will continue to own it. It’s about whakanui i te tamaiti, whakamana i te tamaiti.”  
He says the policy of Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Ngā Mokopuna, where he is principal, is that every wharekura (secondary school immersion) student will achieve level 3 and university entrance with a minimum of 60 credits. The national requirement is 42 credits. “This gives them first dibs on their programme of choice by and large.”
Whānau at Te Kura o Otari also have a vision about sharing te reo with others – “we wish all the children at Otari school could learn the reo – that’s our aim,” says Tania Loughlin, who is the Māori immersion strand representative on the school’s board.


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Teaching concepts for Māori students
Ako – not only students learning from teachers, but also teacher as learner, and students and parent as teachers
Awhi, manaaki - caring for learners, getting to know them
Whakapapa, whānaungatanga - getting to know their whakapapa and making connections
Tuakana/teina - encouraging older students to support and help younger ones
Relationships between kura/schools and whānau, hapū, iwi - building those connections and understandings
Teacher knowledge of te reo and tikanga
Whānau support and empowerment
Manaaki manuhiri/tikanga/powhiri within kura/schools
-  from “Māori Teaching Pedagogies: Where to From Here?” by Tangiwai Rewi in Kia Tangi Te Titi Permission to Speak: Successful Schooling for Māori students in the 21st Century, edited by Dr Paul Whitinui and published by the NZCER Press in June.


Check out - Tātaiako: Cultural Competencies for Teachers of Māori Learners, a new resource from the Ministry of Education that explains the competencies teachers need so they can help Māori learners achieve educationally as Māori. Unfortunately, it’s not compulsory.