We hope 2023 is going well for you and your loved ones. It’s been a busy and exciting few months for the Tauiwi Tautoko community. We wanted to share with you just a few things that we’ve been up to so far this year. 

In April, we launched the first Tauiwi of the Global Majority* (TGM) course in Tāmaki Makaurau / Auckland - a version of the course by and for tauiwi of colour. Wendy Wong and co-lead Lincoln Dam were crucial in both redesigning and running this course. We will spend the rest of the year reflecting on learnings from this pilot and refining the course for a next offering in 2024. We also ran the biggest training and facilitator team to date for tauiwi Pākehā, with over 60 participants and five facilitators. We’re about to open registrations for our next Pākehā training in October, with Amanda Schulze stepping into the role of lead facilitator. We would be grateful if you could share with your networks information about that upcoming course here.  

We’ve also begun to offer organisational training this year. In March, Amanda Schulze ran a workshop with the Auckland Women’s Centre. In June, Emily Beausoleil, Wendy Wong and Amanda ran two workshops with 40 staff from Te Whatu Ora Hawke’s Bay. Preparations are currently underway for two workshops with history teachers across the country, organised by the New Zealand History Teachers’ Association, and conversations are underway with three other groups. We’re excited about this new phase for Tauiwi Tautoko, and what it means for being able to work collectively and build community in this practice.

Our team also continues to grow and change to meet new needs and opportunities. We were very fortunate to have Kay Benseman (Pākehā) join the Tauiwi Tautoko whānau as our new Community Weaver in March. In this role, Kay has been caring for and supporting our volunteer community through Monthly Meetups, a new regular Book Club, and a regional catch up in Pōneke / Wellington at Space Place for Matariki Puanga. She has also been working to expand the ways our volunteer community can collaborate meaningfully in their anti-racism work, with new online spaces to spark connection and support. Kay is also looking at ways we can grow our relationships - and enable coordination - with other organisations, groups, and campaigns so that we are increasingly impactful and trusted.

In June, we also established a formal pro bono guiding group of long-term TT alumni, supporters and advisors - tentatively called “The Aunties”. The group comprises Alanna Irving, Vish Tymkin and Michelle Wanwimolruk, who are there to provide guidance where we need it as we continue to grow and change. “The Aunties” and the core Tauiwi Tautoko team came together in Pōneke in June to co-design how we will work together going forward. Finally, our team’s grown to include two alumni who are helping us with the financial aspects of the work as co-Treasurers - Roseanne Hosken and Hannah Seeman - who, like the Aunties, have already proven themselves utterly invaluable! We also continue to meet with our tāngata whenua advisory group twice a year, which continually gives us so much crucial guidance.

As well as our formal trainings and now, thanks to Kay, greater community support, we are increasingly involved in strategic projects that are helping deepen our relationships with the wider community of groups working for Te Tiriti transformation. One of these projects, borne of the brilliant and timely suggestion of Tauiwi Tautoko alumna Sue Abel, is the design and national launch of a Kai and Kōrero-style Co-governance Conversations Host Guide, to support conversations in local communities in the months leading up to election. Collaborating with members of Tauiwi mō Matike Mai Aotearoa and with guidance from Iwi Chairs Forum, members of the Groundwork team, and Te Tiriti educators from across the country, Emily and Tauiwi Tautoko volunteers Chris Thornley and Sarah Morris wrote the conversation guide and helped launch a 7-part training and support series for volunteers who wished to host co-governance conversations in their communities. Tauiwi mō Matike Mai are hosting the series again with a new group of volunteers, so that more conversations are still unfolding in the months ahead. As this team developed the guide, Sue and other collaborators - including another amazing TT alumna Jenny Rankine - worked simultaneously to develop a website of resources on co-governance, hosted by our affiliate organisation Te Tiriti-Based Futures, which you can find here. 

Network Waitangi Whangārei invited Emily to write this year’s Joan Cook Memorial Essay “State of the Pākehā Nation”, an invitation she extended to long-time Tauiwi Tautoko alumni and other collaborators so that this year’s address now brings together 14 voices on what is needed for Pākehā to contribute to Te Tiriti transformation. You’ll see some familiar names from our amazing volunteer community and team - Kate Frykberg, Kelly Dorgan, Helena Mayer, and others - attesting to but also strengthening our community both within Tauiwi Tautoko and within the broader ecosystem of change. You can read that address here. 

As always, we are grateful to all those who have supported us. We wouldn’t have been able to do any of this without the generous support of J R McKenzie, Tindall Foundation, and Tai Shan Foundation. We are also continually floored and strengthened by the community of volunteers whose many varied ways of contributing make all this possible. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou katoa!

*Global Majority is a collective term that first and foremost speaks to and encourages those so-called to think of themselves as belonging to the majority on planet earth. It refers to people who are Black, African, Asian, Brown, dual-heritage, indigenous to the global south, and or, have been racialised as 'ethnic minorities'.” – Rosemary Campbell-Stephens MBE.