Te Kura Tuatahi o Matua Ngaru

The Matua Ngaru School adventure begins... 

Actually, it began for me in June 2017 when the Establishment Board of Trustees appointed me as principal and co-opted me onto the Board.  A lot of work had been completed already including drafting the school zone with principals and BoT representatives from local schools: Huapai District School, Waimauku School, Taupaki School and Riverhead School.
The Establishment Board also successfully coordinated the renaming of the school from Kumeu Primary School to Matua Ngaru School:

The Ngati Whatua chief of the Waimauku/Huapai district could see the changes occurring to the land where his iwi lived by the Kaipara River. He climbed Pukeatua Mountain seeking spiritual support and guidance as to what he must do.  He witnessed the approach of a great wave coming up the river against the river current. This sign gave him reason to descend to his village where he instructed his iwi to move the village to the edge of the track that had been cleared in preparation for future changes. That track became the railway line that is still in use today and the road that crosses over the line is called Matua.  Matua Ngaru refers to the vision that the chief had seen from Pukeatua. Hence the name “Te Kura Tuatahi o Matua Ngaru”

Being appointed so early on meant that I was able to participate in some milestone events including the soil turning at the site of our kura, meeting with ERO in the pre-establishment year and designing a recruitment process for Deputy Principals and Lead Learning Coaches with Cognition Education.  I was also co-opted onto the Establishment Board of Trustees.

As a Board, we began co-constructing our vision in July with the guidance of our Governance Facilitator- Micheal King, Board Chair- Alan Curtis and iwi influence from Te Rongopai Morehu and Tracy Davis who are with Ngati Whatua o Kaipara.  The result:

Ubiquitous Learning, on a Wave of Change

See some of our work here:

I feel so fortunate to have had this time with the Board before I started as Principal as it enabled me to build relationships, understand more about governance and begin to ideate our way forward at Matua Ngaru.