Wellington College of Education was established in 1888 with the purpose of educating teachers in New Zealand. It became the Faculty of Education of Victoria University of Wellington,formed from the School of Education of the University,and the Wellington College of Education on 1 January 2005.
The University of New Zealand was New Zealand's sole degree-granting university from 1874 to 1961. It was a collegiate university embracing several constituent institutions at various locations around New Zealand.
The Ministry of Education is the public service department of New Zealand charged with overseeing the New Zealand education system.
Clarence Edward Beeby,most commonly referred to as C.E. Beeby or simply Beeb,was a New Zealand educationalist and psychologist. He was influential in the development of the education system in New Zealand,first as a director of the New Zealand Council for Educational Research (NZCER) from 1936,and then as Director of Education from 1940,initially under the First Labour Government. He also served as ambassador to France and on the UNESCO executive.
The development of state education in New Zealand has been shaped by social and political interactions between Māori as tangata whenua of the land,missionaries,settlers,voluntary organisations and those charged with consolidating central state control. While the initiatives and systems were driven by colonial ambitions to protect and civilise the indigenous people through assimilation,and install a model of education based on European concepts of the purposes and delivery of learning,there have been times when Māori actively engaged with the process to retain their traditional knowledge and language. Examples of this were Māori participation in the early missions schools,contestation and resistance against many processes of Native schools and the establishment of Kura Kaupapa Māori. Following the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840,New Zealand became a British Crown Colony,and by 1852 the state of New Zealand had assumed a full legislative role in education. A series of acts of parliament have attempted to resolve differences between competing interests as the country faced social,cultural and economic challenges. This has continued,arguably,as a desire for democratic and progressive education and the creation and ongoing reform of an education system that aims to reduce inequalities and enable social mobility. As a response to criticism of the education system and the role of the state in managing and delivering equitable learning,there were radical reforms in the late 1980s. These changes resulted in the establishment of self-managing schools and a decentralization of the system,with the Department of Education being replaced by the Ministry of Education whose role has been to implement government reforms. Some of these,in governance models for schools,assessment and reporting,class sizes,payroll,school closures and building maintenance,have been controversial.
Rawinia Ruth Higgins is a New Zealand academic whose research focuses on Māori language and culture.
Ocean Ripeka Mercier is a New Zealand academic specialising in physics and Māori science.
Crispin William Gardiner is a New Zealand physicist,who has worked in the fields of quantum optics,ultracold atoms and stochastic processes. He has written about 120 journal articles and several books in the fields of quantum optics,stochastic processes and ultracold atoms
Margaret Ann Carr is a New Zealand education academic. She is currently emeritus professor at the University of Waikato.
Anna Jackson is a New Zealand poet,fiction and non-fiction writer and an academic.
Barbara Helen Else,also known as Barbara Neale,is a New Zealand writer,editor,and playwright. She has written novels for adults and children,plays,short stories and articles and has edited anthologies of children's stories. She has received a number of awards and fellowships including the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to literature,the Storylines Margaret Mahy Medal and the Victoria University of Wellington's Writer's Fellowship.
Jennifer Lillian Beck is a New Zealand writer of over 50 children’s books. Her work,often focusing on themes of history,peace and war,has won numerous prizes and awards. She lives in Auckland,New Zealand.
Tina Makereti is a New Zealand novelist,essayist,and short story writer,editor and creative writing teacher. Her work has been widely published and she has been the recipient of writing residencies in New Zealand and overseas. Her book Once Upon a Time in Aotearoa won the inaugural fiction prize at the NgāKupu Ora Māori Book Awards in 2011,and Where the Rēkohu Bone Sings won the NgāKupu Ora Aotearoa Māori Book Award for Fiction in 2014. She lives on the Kāpiti Coast,New Zealand.
Marie Bell was a New Zealand educationalist,lecturer and teacher who had a career lasting almost three-quarters of a century. Her career was governed by a child-friendly and progressive outlook that she was exposed to at Wellington Teachers' College. Bell was a supervisor and teacher who introduced a child-led education philosophy to allow children to learn in their own development and interests into New Zealand schools. She also worked for various associations,committees,conferences,commissions and educational boards to further early childhood learning.
Sunny Amey is a theatre director and educator born in New Zealand. She worked at the National Theatre of England during its formative years alongside Laurence Olivier,as artistic director of Downstage Theatre in the 1970s and the director of New Zealand's national drama school Toi Whakaari in the late 1980s.
Rangimārie Te Turuki Arikirangi Rose Pere was a New Zealand educationalist,spiritual leader,Māori language advocate,academic and conservationist. Of Māori descent,she affiliated with the iwi Ngāi Tūhoe,Ngāti Ruapani and Ngāti Kahungunu. Her influences spread throughout New Zealand in education and well-being and she was renowned on the international stage as an expert in indigenous knowledge.
Rānui Ngārimu is a New Zealand Māori weaver and textile artist. She affiliates with Ngāi Tahu and Ngāti Mutungāiwi.
Aotearoa New Zealand's histories (ANZH) and Te Takanga o Te Wā are documents for use in English- and Maori-medium New Zealand curriculums from 2023 to guide the explicit and compulsory teaching about the country's history. Although the final documents,released in 2022,were part of reviews of the New Zealand education system by the newly elected Labour government from 2017,there had been pressure building prior to this for the focus of the reforms to be on developing a curriculum that truly reflected the history of New Zealand. This had included a petition taken to parliament in 2015 by high school students expressing concerns about how the New Zealand wars were being taught,ongoing debate in the media amongst academics and educationists and another petition urging teaching of New Zealand histories to be compulsory. In response to this,the government created an advisory group in 2018,and in 2019 initiated a recommendation from the group to establish an agreed process for updating the National Curriculum. After a process of consultation,draft documents were trialled and reviewed in 2021 and the final copies launched in March 2022,with the expectation that schools will have the reforms implemented by 2023.
Te Whāriki,or Te Whāriki He whāriki mātauranga mōngāmokopuna o Aotearoa,is New Zealand's early years curriculum guideline. It is published by Ministry of Education,and has been recognised worldwide for its approach to early learning. The word Te Whāriki means 'woven mat' in Māori.
