In May 2012, after a long and impressive career, Luanna Meyer retired from her role as Professor of Education and Director of the Jessie Hetherington Centre for Educational Research at Victoria University. The tributes paid at her retirement ceremony bear testament to a woman who is held in high esteem in the educational community. In this…

Recent social policy discourses in Aotearoa New Zealand focus on vulnerable children's well-being and the detrimental, long-term and costly impacts of child poverty. The discourse pervading much of the policy labels children and young people as "vulnerable" or "at risk" or "in crisis", a view, which we argue, is both…

An innovative ICT project called "Compose" has been implemented in some New Zealand primary schools in an effort to counteract the lack of classroom composition opportunities. "Compose" combines the use of music software and online learning with attempts to address barriers to primary classroom composition. This article…

This article documents the author's personal journey as a new evaluator traversing paradigms, continents, and timelines on a quest to discover how best to practice evaluation for the benefit of Maori people (indigenous to New Zealand). The journey has taken the author to a number of evaluation conferences in Australasia and North America, which…

A night-time canoe trip during an outdoor education program in New Zealand became a powerful experience of "sacred place." Geopiety (attachment and reverence for particular places) is evident in the cultures of all people. Outdoor education can foster spiritual growth, thus educating the whole child, by providing opportunities for…

In 1984, New Zealand tested 12- and 13- year-old and 15- and 16-year old students as part of the International Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) tests. Although weaknesses appeared at both age levels in the organization of material, particularly in argumentative and expository writing, students could write functional letters competently…

This article presents commentaries on being gay in Japan and China by distinguished educators with various backgrounds and from different countries. Given space limitations, these are more evocative than particulate, but collectively they provide multiple platforms for reflection. As noted by some commentators in this article and others (e.g.,…

Michael Marquet of New Zealand left school 10 years ago, not able to read or write and with a serious speech problem. He had spent 9 years in a special class and had learned very little. He had completed 2 years of high school and left at the end of the fourth form, at the age of 15 and with no qualifications. However, he had participated in a…

An educational researcher describes and reflects on a qualitative research project she conducted, focusing on her positioning, neutrality, and objectivity throughout the research process and during subsequent data analysis. The research took place in a K-12 school in a remote rural New Zealand community inhabited by Maori, 1970s…

Describes the experiences of three American librarians who had temporary assignments in other countries: one in New Zealand, in an urban primary school library; one in South Africa at a small polytechnic college bringing telecommunications into the library; and one in Laos to classify and catalog a polytechnic institute library's backlog. (LRW)