It seems appropriate that in Te Wiki o te Reo Māori I had the opportunity to have a conversation with Bianca Elkington and Kathleen O’Hare about the establishment of Kura Toa in Porirua.
What makes this story particularly interesting to me is that Kura Toa isn’t simply a new school opening its doors. It has grown from more than a decade of work with Ngāti Toa whānau and young people – an education ecosystem built around community, identity, relationships and aspirations.
For me, there are some important future-focused ideas that were shared in this conversation.
The first is community. Kura Toa isn’t being designed as a school operating in isolation from its community. Whānau are not simply being consulted about the school; their aspirations and knowledge are helping to shape what the school becomes.
The second is the idea of starting with the person, rather than the curriculum. Before deciding what should be taught, there is a commitment to knowing who the learner is – their strengths, their identity, their whānau, their aspirations and what matters to them.
And then there is the Mauri Ora plan that provides the mechanism that enables this personalised approach to curriculum. It provides a particularly powerful example of what it might mean to put a graduate profile into practice. It isn’t a statement framed on a wall or something revisited at reporting time. The intention is for it to become part of the everyday work of teachers – a source of knowledge about each learner and their aspirations that sits alongside professional knowledge when curriculum and learning are designed.
That raises an important question for all of us involved in education – what would change if our vision for the learner genuinely became the organising principle for curriculum, pedagogy and relationships?
I found this conversation both challenging and encouraging. Kura Toa is clearly on a journey, and Bianca and Kathleen are very open about being learners themselves. But perhaps that is part of what makes it worth listening to.
They’re not simply talking about creating a different school. They’re asking what education might look like when community, identity, aspiration and the future are allowed to shape the design from the beginning.
I hope you’ll take the time to listen to our conversation (video embedded below)
For more information check out these links:
- Kura Toa – Learning Without Limits (School Website)
- Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira (iwi website)
- Conversations on the future of education (podcast series – all episodes)
