20 July 2023

Te Ara Tipu – Path of Growth – is our national tertiary student development programme which runs from April to November. It brings together students from all three Centres to help them gain a better understanding of the opportunities the Asia-Pacific offers to them.

For the second Te Ara Tipu group session in 2023, we organised a two-day visit to Wellington and arranged a series of activities for students, including a roundtable discussion with two early career speakers, a private tour at Te Papa with a focus on kaitiakitanga, and a keynote speaker panel. 19 students from both the 2022 and 2023 cohort joined the events.

The roundtable discussion session was co-designed with Te Ara Tipu members from the 2022 cohort who expressed they would like to meet more early career speakers. We invited two young professionals, Regan Thompson-Taurima from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Luke Fuller from the Wellington Chamber of Commerce. Regan and Luke shared their stories with the group and answered any questions about their respective journeys, all of which students found very relatable. Needless to say, discussions were buzzing.

For the next day, we organised a guided tour of Te Papa that highlighted the importance of kaitiakitanga and the sustainable use of land in order for our natural environment to keep flourishing. This theme was continued in the keynote speaker panel that followed the tour.

For the panel we invited Christian Schott from Victoria University of Wellington and Sarah Bogle from KMPG to talk about their career path and the work they do in the area of sustainability. Christian discussed his research on tourism and sustainability as well as the use of virtual reality headsets in his teaching. He even brought the headsets to the session for students to experience his approach first hand. Sarah spoke about her work with businesses looking to improve their processes in light of the impending climate crisis, and she also pointed out the challenges businesses will face in the future to address sustainability.

Students returned to their homes with their buckets full of new experiences, food for thought, and more connections to leverage on their future pathways.