Projects

This project investigated how cultural concepts are incorporated into pharmacist preceptorship practices, with an emphasis on how these practices are explicitly demonstrated and communicated to pharmacy students during placements, identify knowledge gaps and challenges relevant to pharmacist precepting.

Project lead: Associate Professor Byron Rangiwai (Ngāti Manawa, Ngāti Whare, Ngāi Tūhoe, Ngāti Porou), Unitec Institute of Technology | Te Whare Wānanga o Wairaka

This foundational phase of He Ara Mārama establishes the kaupapa, relationships, and credibility required to guide a multi-phase research programme focused on ADHD in Māori adulthood. ADHD remains significantly under-researched among Māori, particularly beyond childhood (Rangiwai, 2024; Tipene, 2023).

The project forms part of the wider initiative Manaakitia Te Reo: How Do We Support Assessments in Te Reo Māori, which aims to improve how tertiary institutions support and mark work submitted in Māori.

This project focussed on expanding the conceptual lens of ADHD, focusing on traditional Māori narratives such as pūrākau and whakataukī to understand the Māori experience of ADHD and create an accommodating framework.

Awardee: Anna Adcock (Ngati Mutunga), Victoria University of Wellington

The Awardee will undertake the Whakaaweawe Impact and Transformation Grant titled Te Rito o te Harakeke: Collective Resilience and Relational Research with Whānau Māori.

This project supports the dissemination of doctoral research through presentation at the Indigenous Futures Unbound: Indigenous knowledges leading transformative futures conference, held on Kabi Kabi Country, Sunshine Coast, Australia, in November 2025. He Tamariki Kokoti Tau was a longitudinal Kaupapa Māori study with whānau Māori whose pēpi were born preterm. The PhD research, Te Rito o te Harakeke, followed whānau through birth, neonatal intensive care, hospitalisation, and transitions home. It illuminated whānau experiences of resilience and aroha, showing that preterm birth is not only a medical event but a collective journey of connection, cultural continuity, and Indigenous thrivance.

Awardee: Dan Hikuroa (Tainui, Ngati Maniapoto, Te Arawa), University of Auckland

The Awardee will undertake the Whakaaweawe Impact and Transformation Grant titled Te Waharoa Hīnātore.

Light has always carried meaning. Hīnātore, the soft glow found against Ranginui’s chest, in te moana whitiwhiti a Tangaroa, and sheltered within te wao nui a Tane, connects people to story, place and imagination. For Māori, hīnātore is both a physical phenomenon and a spiritual presence, embodied as an atua, whose light guides, inspires, and sustains connection between people, whenua and the cosmos.