Victoria University of Wellington

Dr Lynne Russell works as a Senior Research Fellow - Maori Health with the Health Services Research Centre (HSRC) at Victoria University of Wellington. Much of her professional and academic work has centred around the Indigenous knowledge and healing practices used in recovery from trauma associated with mental distress, suicide loss and self-harm. She describes herself as an writer, activist and public speaker stirred by cultural resilience, social justice, Indigenous and LGBTI rights, and the amplification of voices more readily silenced in society.

David is the Programme Director - First Year Design at the School of Design. He gained his qualification for Victoria University of Wellington

Mike is a lecturer at Te Kawa a Māui, where he teaches courses on Māori language and customs.

Dr Tina Makereti has a PhD and Masters in Creative Writing from the International Institute of Modern Letters. She is a novelist, essayist, curator and short fiction writer. Her first novel, Where the Rēkohu Bone Sings (Vintage, 2014) has been described as a New Zealand classic and 'a remarkable first [book that] spans generations of Moriori, Māori and Pākehā descendants as they grapple with a legacy of pacifism, violent domination and cross-cultural dilemmas.' It was longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award 2016 and won the 2014 Ngā Kupu Ora Aotearoa Māori Book Award for Fiction.

Adreanna is a Senior Lecturer in Te Kura Māori in the Faculty of Education. Her research interests include youth, education, and health as well as Māori development with a specific interest in Indigenous – ethnic minority youth and how existent issues within the community influence life experience and the articulation of that experience.

Tia is a lecturer at the school of psychology, Victoria University of Wellington. Her research interests include four key areas, broadly linked and overarched by relationships within Māori and Indigenous Developmental Psychology.

These areas include:

• Indigenous and developmental psychology in the interdependent relations between whānau and their children’s learning
• Autobiographical memory with whanau
• Language research
• Māori pediatric health

Ocean’s teaching and research interests are varied, but her key focus is how mātauranga Māori and science connect and relate, particularly in educational contexts and using novel digital technologies. She co-leads a National Science Challenge project investigating the perceptions of novel biotechnological controls of pest wasps in Aotearoa. Her research also involves kaupapa Māori reading of films. She is the presenter of Māori Television's Project Mātauranga and presents for TVNZ’s Coast.