LOOKING AFTER WELLBEING - WHERE I'VE STARTED.

 As part of this study sabbatical, I've prioritized learning more about how I can better look after myself with a particular focus on wellbeing.  Towards the end of 2024, I was burnt out.  I felt incredibly unwell physically and mentally drained.  I didn't realise it until the year had ended and work stopped. 

As a woman in leadership, I know about the importance of self-care.  We hear about it and talk about it all the time in our principal groups, and at conferences and workshops.  So I found it difficult to wrap my head around the fact that I hadn't taken in all that I'd learned in this space.  The question is "What works for me? How can I look after myself better?".

This year I intend to find that out, to help me become a better leader in my community.   As part of this learning, I'm reading to add effective tools into my kete that work for me and I'm starting with the book "Atomic Habits" by James Clear.  What a great place to start!  This book is a great window into understanding habits, making and breaking them, and reflecting on how I manage my life both professionally and at home.  As I read, I highlighted the lightbulb moments that gave me motivation and affirmation of what I'm already doing and what I can do better.  These are a few of the gems I took from this book:

•  1% better every day and how the effects of small habits compound over time.
• Forget about goals, focus on systems.
• Three layers of behaviour change - outcomes, process, and identity (Identity being the most important - habits matter because they help you become the person you want to be).
• Design and environment of success - this matters more than motivation (make cues of good habits obvious in your environment and cues of your bad habits invisible).
• Prime your environment to make future actions easier.
• We imitate the habits of 3 groups - the close, the many, and the powerful.  We soak up the qualities and practices of those around us (join a culture where your desired behaviour is the normal behaviour).
• Life feels reactive, but it's actually predictive - you are endlessly predicting what will happen in the next moment.
• Reprogramme your brain to enjoy hard habits - imagine changing just one word from 'have' to. You 'get' to.
• Make it easy for habits to happen - the most effective form of learning is practice, not planning. 
• To build a habit you need to practice it (action).
• Focus on action, not being in motion - being in motion is planning and strategising but they don't produce results.  Action is the type of behaviour that will deliver outcomes.

So, what have I learned from these gems and what will I do differently?  

• Walking...I'm not saying daily because I don't want to beat myself up if I miss a day.  So I'm going to aim to walk 4-5 days per week and cover 5-6kms per walk.  This is manageable because I've now got the time to do it...and a dog that needs walking.
• Skincare.  This is something I've never been good at nor consistent in and it's one thing that is noticeable to me.  I always think I'm too tired or too busy to think about looking after that side of myself, so a visit to a skin care clinic and the purchase of a few products to make a habit of looking after my skin more consistently is important to me.  Prioritising this particularly before I fall into bed each night is one habit I want to focus on.
• Creating an environment to make these two things happen - walking gear ready to go the night before (the first thing I see when I get out of bed), and skincare products at the ready in the bathroom.
• Eating...no more processed food purchases - particularly my kryptonite (potato chips and ice cream).  Change out the junk for fresh whole foods e.g: carrots and humus or nuts for snacks.  I also love to juice so will get back into my juicing routine.

Well...I'll reflect back on this post halfway through the year and see how these initial habits are going.  

STUDY AND A BIT OF SELF-CARE.

I have been blessed this year to have been granted study leave to do my Masters of Educational Leadership.  What a privilege! I am humbled to have this opportunity with the support of my whanau and school community and a little guilty to be walking away from my school for the year.  I spent just over a week at school at the beginning of this month (Jan) prepping my office for the Acting Principal (Deputy Principal stepping up).  We also had 3 days working together doing a handover for him to access everything he needs.  I am fortunate that I have an amazing leadership team who love our community. I have full faith that they will 'stay the course' of the strategic direction, maintain the community's expectations, and continue to go above and beyond for our students.  

We agreed that it's best that I completely step out to ensure continuity of communication and decision-making.  This is a big call for me because while I'm not a control freak and I don't micromanage, I'm so used to being the decision-maker that I'm already feeling FOMO.  The Acting Principal and I will meet off-site every 3 weeks or so just for a coffee and a catch-up so that he can fill me in on everything and keep me in the loop.  I am available 24/7 by phone for him and he is aware of the 'no surprises' rule.  I'm also obviously still available by email (out-of-office auto-reply on) and am on all school lists so I get to see what's happening communications-wise.  Staff will go to him...I'm out for the year.  

So, what will this year mean for me then?  While school will always be in the back of my mind, the Masters papers will be at the front.  I'm looking forward to the learning and what it will bring to my kete of knowledge and experiences in leadership.  It's a little nerve-wracking getting back into the assignments and lectures again, especially at Masters level, but my nerdy self thrives on it, so I'm nervous and excited.  

I think the thing I'm most looking forward to is having room in my headspace for me.  Having time to focus on just me and my whanau.  In the busy world of Principalship, I admit that I struggle with leaving work at work...in fact, ask any principal and it's near impossible to do.  Even when you're not at work, you're thinking about it; checking emails, or doing a multitude of tasks that you just didn't quite get to while at school.  So I'm excited to be spending time with my whanau being truly present.  It's a skill that I intend to develop and practice while on leave.  I'm also excited about going overseas for an actual 'holiday'.  It will be nice to get cheap airfares and catch up with family overseas.  I also intend to read a few books, which I generally do anyway but these are books that I'm hoping will help me better manage my self-care when I do get back behind the desk in 2026. I will be writing more about those books as I read them...just a review because I can.

NZPF Conference - Otautahi Christchurch 2024 - Welcome and Presidents Address.

 This year the NZPF ran a combined conference with the Australian Primary Principals Association - Tau Mai, Tau Tahi - Trans-Tasman Principal's conference.  There are close to 1000 attendees from across Aotearoa and Australia, this being the first trans-Tasman conference in close to 10 years.

The conference was opened and the welcome given by Leanne Otene, President of the New Zealand Principal's Federation.  While the event is jointly hosted by both countries, as the tangata whenua is was important to greet our Australian guests to Aoatearoa New Zealand.   In her welcome Leanne acknowledged many people, special guests, present and past members and mana whenua.  She gave information on what was coming, common themes identified between our two countries and the importance of support and collaboration between our two countries.  Following her welcome, she introduced Angela Falkenberg, President of the Australian Primary Principal's Association.

Angela's address spoke to the similarities in success and struggle that Australia and New Zealand had,
speaking candidly of the pressures that the profession in general is under.  She iterated that for all present in the room, our children were central to all we do.  A balanced curriculum, tending to the needs of students outside of just literacy and numeracy, is just as important to support students social and emotional growth is just as important as academic pursuits.  Angela acknowledged teacher burnout and retention, the struggle to find teachers which is now a global trend, and the need for governments to do something.  There is much to be done in education and with hope and collaboration we will grow.

Curriculum Voices Group - Re-establishment, moving forward, achieving the purpose of the curriculum.

 

The Curriculum Voices Group was established by the Ministry of Education Curriculum team in 2020 to garner feedback on the NZ Curriculum Refresh.  I was fortunate to go on the group as a representative of the New Zealand Pacifica Principals' Association and my role is to offer a Pacifica lens to the decision makers, giving feedback on drafts as they are presented, give input to discussion on what the curriculum needs in order for every New Zelander to see themselves in it.  The group consisted of representatives from a very broad range of stakeholders in education from across New Zealand.  In addition to all this, school principals in this group, also provide information and suggestions on how the new document might best be implemented across Aotearoa.

The group had been meeting 3-4 times per year up until mid 2023 when elections were about to happen.  When the new government came into power, the group was shut down with a great deal of review and restructuring taking place at the Ministry of Education.  The new Minister, Erica Stanford, established a Ministry Advisory Group to review where the review was 'at' and advise her on where to next to meet the expectations of the new government in terms of content and delivery.  What has come out of this group's recommendations with the support of the Minister has been shared in draft with the public in the last month - with the draft Maths curriculum Years 0-8 and the draft English curriculum Years 0-6 (still can't understand why this curriculum hasn't been delivered 0-8?).

With the documents in draft form and with still more to do, the CVG has been re-established to once again provide a broad stakeholder lens over the changes and Tuesday 11 September was our first meeting back.

The meeting started with setting the scene, where we started in 2020 to where we got to in 2023 and the intentions of the group moving forward.  We are not there to bring down the process, rather collaborate and lift it, to provide feedback and an outside voice to writers and decision makers on content, efficiency, practicality, design, implementation and achieving the purpose lifting the success for all ākonga.

The curriculum team shared what's changed and what hasn't so far in the development of the document since the new government has been in:  

What's changed -

• A new set of design criteria
• The inclusion of the "Science of Learning" (knowledge of learning) with an emphasis on content not context.
• Year by Year detail focused on 'what to teach'.
• A bigger document that involves 'teaching methods' (putting the 'common practice model' within the document instead of sitting outside of it).
• Online access - it will not be distributed in hard copy because there is so much more detail in it.

What's the same:

• The Te Mātaiaho framework is still in place 
• Understand, Know, Do is still the working model for delivery with a greater emphasis on the 'know'.
• There is still 8 learning areas.
• Gazetting to 2027 is still in place with an interim process for review throughout the timeframe - tweaking as we go to ensure it works.
• Phases remain in place with year to year detail sitting within them.

The Literacy writing team shared an outline of the draft so far.  In the draft there is a clear explanation of the 'Science of Learning' which comes under Teaching Guidance.  There is also the inclusion of teaching sequence and methods and a new area in Oral Language (which I'm pleased about).  Much of the writing is critiqued by ERO who have identified 5 key areas of practice and supports.  There was a whole lot more presented and discussed which I didn't quite capture here but I did raise the question along with representatives of students with special needs - who was at the table from foundation of writing this curriculum, with a Pacifica/Māori lens? What about the special needs lens? In my view there is still a glaring hole in the document lacking reference to ESOL students.  There is much work to be done in this space so I'm hoping that the writers listen to feedback from consultation and that teachers/educators take the time to give strong feedback in these areas.  There is over 100 pages in the document.  It's cumbersome to manage in terms of being user friendly for teachers in their planning.  Hopefully the website will have links (without it being a rabbit hole) to make it accessible and streamlined.

Following the literacy team, we then were informed about implementation from the Ministry team.  The plan over time, the expectations and the intent behind managing change.  There was much discussion around the room about the realities of managing change within the ever fluid school environment.  Concerns were expressed for the rate of change, the narrowing of the curriculum, the decisions being made without in-depth consultation and collaboration with the sector.  There is still parts of the system that haven't been considered in implementation, notably special needs schools/students, small schools, rural schools and representation of Pacific/Māori communities. How is the government going to support these areas to successfully navigate change and implementation?

All in all the day was enlightening and draining.  There's a lot to think about.  The table of people I sat with discussed in depth the changes taking place in the system at the moment.  All agreed it is overwhelming and too fast.  Theres too much to do, too much to cover and too much to take in.  

In addition to curriculum change there is also changes to the education act section 127 which puts added pressure onto boards and reduce aspects of the human rights and Te Tiriti in the act.  

Our table agreed to this one thing in particular - "If there is a 'crisis' in education...then provide "crisis" level interventions such as shutting schools for a half day every week for 'X' number of terms to ensure that implementation of these key documents and programmes of work are done properly, thoroughly and with fidelity."  Of course the government wouldn't see this as necessary because of the cost to voters who would have to arrange child care during those hours.  I often reflect on how seriously 'short term' foresight into implementation hampers the system hugely.  Lay people can think 'how hard can it be?'.  I understand that many people are in occupations that are stressful and all consuming.   Those in the stressful occupations should walk in teachers shoes for a week to get a real picture of what the role entails.  Teachers are a special breed.  They wear more than one hat, they wear many. Time is precious and of the essence.  It is NOT a 40 hour week, their job doesn't stop when they go home at night, they are not just educators, our content and environment is forever changing and evolving.  We just need time to make sure we are keeping up and doing it right.

NZPF Keynote: Dr Hana O'Regan

The opening keynote speaker for the NZPF conference was Dr Hana O'Regan.  Hana's address was incredibly provocative and confronting.  I learned a new word today - coloniality - "the set of attitudes, values, ways of knowing, and power structures upheld as normative by Western colonising societies and serving to rationalise and perpetuate Western dominance".

Hana spoke of the coloniality of power (hierarchical classification of diverse groups by race to justify their exploitation), coloniality of knowledge (legitimation of Eurocentric knowledge as the only valid one and the negation of other knowledge systems), and coloniality of being (Inferiorisation of oppressed groups, prejudices, discrimination and violence because of ethnic or gender, or other origins). She put the idea of coloniality not just within an Aotearoa perspective but made references to other Indigenous cultures that have been impacted by colonisation including those in Western countries and the destruction of other Indigenous languages in Wales, Ireland, America, and Canada.

During this keynote, we were taken on a journey of colonialism in education that I just hadn't fully understood.  We looked at bias and stereotyping in education created long ago, drilling into the foundation of our education system, its intentions at the time, and whether equity was a consideration in its establishment.  We were then shown the systematic attempt to disestablish languages and cultures through legislation, rules, degradation, and humiliation.

This was a brilliant opening speaker for this conference because it was attended by Principals from both New Zealand and Australia, for which equity plays such an important role in our positions.  I hope that all participants were challenged by the messages in this session, and questioned their position and where they sit in understanding racism, colonisation, and generational trauma.  I left the room at the end feeling confronted, reflecting on how my schema has positioned me.  What have I done that supports coloniality?  How do we, as principals, reduce coloniality in our communities when the system we work in is grounded in colonialism?  

There is work to be done.

MPA Term 3 Meeting - TE KURO O NGĀ TAPUWAE

 On Thursday 29 August the MPA had their term 3 meeting at Te Kura o Ngā Tapuwae.  This was quite an event for many of the Principals in attendance as it was their first time in the school.

Ngā Tapuwae has a very long history in Māngere.  The Principal, Airhia Stirling, has been Principal there for 28 years and the MPA had the privilege of hearing the stories of the school; where it comes from, how it got its name and what it means.  The Tainui iwi connection and the gifts bestowed in the names of education are strongly connected to Ngā Tapuwae and many others schools in the Mangere area.   The turmoil and adversity encountered through colonialism and racism, the stories over time that have led this amazing school to be a leading light in Māngere, achieving amongst the highest academic results in Aotearoa and consistently high attendance rates.  

The school's physical environment is stunning, with the new build completed in 2020, the school is made up of very modern learning spaces.  We had a tour of the school from top to bottom, each space being very deliberately planned and built with students and learning at the heart.  The environment is a true reflection of the community it serves and students were warm and welcoming and obviously proud of their school.  Our pohiri on to the Marae was beautiful and the association was strongly supported by our local iwi, Ngati Tahinga Wilson and Davika Wilson, of Te Ahirwaru.

I personally deeply appreciated the sharing from Arihia and left feeling a sense of triumph and hope for the students, staff and whanau - past, present and future.

Following our pohiri and school tour, we shared kai and settled in for our termly meeting.  To kick off our meeting, we were joined by our MOE Director Deidre Alderson.  Deidre led us through some of the initiatives the government were implementing and unpacked the expectations of these.  She listened to our concerns regarding the rapidity of change and the lack of collaboration between the sector in informing the new curriculum being introduced.  There were also concerns expressed regarding the lack of resourcing and support for students with high needs in schools.  This is ongoing and exacerbated by the push for more change over a short period of time.  We are worried about burnout.

After Deidre and her team left, we had a brief discussion on the MPAs position in regards to the government changes and vision for education moving forward.  Principals expressed their concerns on more specific areas and it was agreed that a media statement was to be formed, agreed upon and sent out by the president on behalf of the association.

Next to present at our meeting was Mary Aue who is leading the MPA 'Back to School' campaign.  Mary is developing a multi-media, multi-generational campaign, reaching out to our community, growing relationships and pushing our back to school messaging in multiple languages.  MPA are really looking forward to seeing this campaign take off.

Lastly our local manuhiri and iwi representatives Stephanie Tawha and Davika Wilson from Te Ahiwaru shared their current data and the programme of work they are carrying out with whanau in our community.  There is much to be done in terms of helping whanau during tough times and Te Ahiwaru are doing amazing mahi in this space.

HEALTH & SAFETY - EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT WORKSHOP

Health and Safety with in a school is a priority for any principal and their board.  It should be a focal point at every board meeting and point of discussion regularly at staff level and community level.  

At Nga Iwi School we have a health and safety officer, a staff member who acts as an overseer/monitor of H&S practices across the school.  Twice a term, the board H&S committee meet to review systems, policies and procedures.  During these meetings, we reflect on the 'Health and Safety at Work Act 2015' document.  This document is a great guide for boards and a great way to inform best practice in school.  The checklists, questions and recommended actions were helpful in guiding our committee to implementing strong H&S  policies and procedures.  

The recent Ministry of Education 'Emergency Management Workshop' which was facilitated by Harrison Tew was a great workshop for consolidating our current policies and procedures.  Harrison Tew is an Emergency Planning company that supports schools in developing emergency plans for a variety of situations - lockdown, fire, flood, weather event, earthquake and many more.  We have them facilitate at our school biannually to check our systems and procedures, facilitate a lockdown and give us training on our lockdown procedures while in action.  We also do our own lockdowns without facilitation to practice any given lockdown situation at any given time.

The main takeaways I received from this workshop were more big picture understanding.  These notes I have taken back to our H&S team for discussion and action:

1. The board are the PCBU (Persons conducting the business undertaking) and are responsible for the H&S of ALL persons on site at all times.
2. The MoE have an EMOG team (Emergency Management Operations Group who are available to offer support should a lockdown occur at our schools.
3. The police will not take over the management of a school lockdown.  This is the responsibility of the school, the police will support where they can (dependent on the issue/situation causing the lockdown).
4. The MoE have a trauma team to assist with media coverage should media approach the school for comment.

In terms of advice moving forward, there are a host of things H&S committees need to be monitoring and maintaining throughout the year:

1. Communication with whanau (families) - notify and share emergency response plans with whanau and students at least twice a year.
2. Create a 'risk awareness' profile for your school.
3. Check emergencies policies for frequency of drills.
4. Check school media and social media policies.
5. Keep a list of websites that can help keep you informed during, particularly, a weather event i.e Auckland council emergency management page - hazard viewer, google maps, Metservice, etc.