Released on 24 May 2022, Manu Kōkiri calls for “transformational change” to the tertiary education system to ensure more Māori success in tertiary education, for the benefit of all New Zealanders.

The think piece was written by Taumata Aronui, a group of Māori education experts, innovators, business leaders and student advocates. The rōpū was brought together in 2019, by the Minister of Education, to provide independent advice on how tertiary education can better respond to the needs of Māori learners, communities, and employers, and to help improve learner and community outcomes.

Taumata Aronui’s overall vision as expressed in Manu Kōkiri is “the best indigenously inspired tertiary education system in the world – one where incredible success is experienced by indigenous people (this is normalised and expected) and where indigenous knowledge and experience influences the sector positively and becomes the inspiration for the success of all. This is an internationally lauded, distinctive Aotearoa-New Zealand tertiary education system where all succeed.” (p. 6).

This vision comprises five aspirations:

• Māori people enjoy significant tertiary education success.
• Māori people enjoy increasing levels of health and wellbeing, including cultural health, and through tertiary education including through designing and delivering tertiary education study themselves.
• Māori people enjoy increasing levels of economic prosperity including significant and meaningful employment success, entrepreneurial and business success through the growth of the ‘Māori economy’.
• The tertiary education sector is positively transformed through the application of the Treaty of Waitangi and a positive engagement with the Māori Treaty partner.
• Aotearoa New Zealand is transformed positively through a tertiary education sector which has embraced the Treaty of Waitangi and the Māori Treaty partner.

Following the release of Manu Kōkiri, Taumata Aronui and education agencies will work together to test and further develop the ideas laid out in the paper, including through targeted engagement.

Manu Kōkiri – Māori Success and Tertiary Education (PDF 13 MB)