Rautaki Māori

By Paige Sillaby, 2nd year MDP student 
 

Paige in front of the Te Whānau o Waipareira office

It’s been a month since I completed my international field placement at Te Whānau o Waipareira, and I am missing my Waipareira whānau, as well as the breath-taking mountains of Aotearoa New Zealand. Words cannot describe how deeply this summer’s field placement has impacted my personal and professional development. 

During the first month of field placement, I spent a lot of my time reading through documents to help me understand Waipareiratanga, which loosely translates as the unique way in that Waipareira operates as Māori organization. Some of the documents that I reviewed were; Te Whānau o Waipareira Strategic Plan, and the Waitangi Tribunal.  I would say that much of the information I learned this summer came from speaking with members of the Strategic Innovation team, as well as Wai- Research team about Maori culture, and the history of Aotearoa.

Mount Eden

My primary research project at Waipareira was to work alongside key staff to research and document the Rautaki Māori – Work-Placed Language Revitalization Strategy pilot. The culmination of this research is a summary report with a toolkit that can be used to implement language revitalization strategies in other Indigenous organizations. The overall purpose of the Rautaki report was to gather feedback from key participants in the Rautaki Māori model and designed to meet the following three objectives.

•          To determine and understand the impacts of Rautaki Māori on Wai-Atamai and Wai-Intel,

•          To identify strengths, challenges, and opportunities of the Rautaki language strategy

•          To document Waipareira Rautaki Māori model as a strategy for workplace language revitalization.

At the end of my placement, Waipareira generously printed out the Rautaki Māori report, which was put together by the Graphic Design team. I was not expecting Waipareira to do this, and I am so appreciative that they provided me with copies to take home and share with Indigenous organizations elsewhere.

Through my time in Aotearoa and especially working on Waipareira language revitalization strategy, I have truly been inspired to learn my Indigenous language. During my three months at Waipareira, I learned a little bit of Te Reo through the Rautaki Māori initiative. One of the Rautaki activities was to build a pepeha. The pepeha is a way of positioning yourself within a Māori worldview.  I am proud to share my pepeha;

Ko Horseshoe te maunga

Ko Simcoe te roto nui ake

Ko te Alantic te moana

Ko Big Canoe te rangatira

Ko Georgina Community Centre te wharenui

Ko Chippewa ki Georgina Island te hapū

Ko Ojibway te iwi

Ko Paige ahau

I would like to say chi-miigwetch/ thank you to Waipareira for hosting my field placement. Also, I recommend checking out #WaiRauMaori on twitter to see some of the awesome Rautaki Māori activities from with summer!

Ngāpuhi

Kia Ora from Aotearoa - Auckland, New Zealand

By Paige Sillaby, 2nd year MDP student

 

Sarah Wood (L) and Paige Sillaby (R) - "Go Blues Go!"

My field placement is with Te Whānau O Waipareira, a Māori health organization located in the largest urban Māori populated city in Aotearoa New Zealand. They offer over 60 different services catering to justice, social, education and health to the Whānau (family) of West Auckland. All services at Waipareira operate within a Whānau Ora framework, a holistic approach to service delivery in which Māori health and wellbeing is centered around the Whānau and not the individual and also premised on the belief that Whānau are their own change agents. Whānau comes first at Waipareira! At Waipareira, all services and programs are strategically designed to support and awhi (help) the entire Whānau including; pepi (babies), tamariki (children), rangatahi (young people), matua (adults), and kaumatua (elderly).

I am working with an amazing team from the Wai-Atamai sector of Waipareira, which consists of three (3) main work streams: 

• Wai- Research - community Indigenous research unit;
• Change and Transformation – developing and embedding change and transformation skills and adaptive leadership across the organization; and
• Strategy, Innovation, Design and Digital Content – bringing the strategic plan to life, piloting and developing innovative approaches within an urban Indigenous context and utilizing design and digital content to illustrate and showcase.

More specifically I am located within the Strategy and Innovation stream which consists of six staff working on the long terms outcomes of Waipareira programming and ensuring strategic milestones are progressing. My main project at Waipareira has been working on a program evaluation for their Rautaki Māori Rauemi. Rautaki is a Te Reo Māori word meaning ‘strategy’, and Rauemi meaning ‘resource’. The Rautaki is essentially an incubated language program within the Wai-Atamai team, which encourages Waipareira staff to practice Te Reo Māori (Māori language) and Tikanga (cultural practices) within the work place. With this evaluation I hope to highlight some next steps on how to spread their Rautaki Māori across the Waipareira organization.

Hoki and Chips in Mission Bay

Through my time here I have gained an understanding of the parallels between Māori and First Nations language health. I believe that Māori of New Zealand are leading the way in terms of Indigenous language revitalization in education: Kohanga Reo (preschool), Kura Kaupapa (primary), Wharekura (secondary), Te Tohu Paetahi, and Te Ataarangi (total immersion); and in work practices, Rautaki Māori. When I return to Canada, I hope to incorporate similar practices into my personal and professional life. I am inspired to learn my language (Ojibway), and use Ojibway words in everyday communication.

In my spare time, I enjoy exploring Aotearoa with fellow MDP student Sarah Wood, who is also conducting her field placement at Waipareira. The staff at Waipareira have been truly amazing, providing us with tons of recommendations and invites. Some highlights from our experience in Aotearoa have been; Waiheke Island, seeing a kiwi in Rotorua, the Waitamo glow worm caves, a rugby game, Hobbiton movie set and eating at every fish and chip shop.

Hobbit Holes