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ATLAANZ


Association
of
Tertiary Learning Advisors
of
Aotearoa
New Zealand


116days until
2010 Conference
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Archived news items


April 10, 2006  Obituary: David Welsh Simpson (1940-2006)

David Welsh Simpson, who established the first tertiary learning support centre in New Zealand, passed away in London on March 6 after being ill for about 15 months.

David can be considered as the father of tertiary learning support in New Zealand as he established the first "Student Learning Unit" (later to become the Student Learning Centre) at the University of Auckland in 1985. For a number of years, David had to work extremely hard to convince university management of the need for such a unit to support student learning needs. The predominant institutional view at the time was that students who enter university should be left to their own devices to "sink or swim." However, not being one to give up easily, and inspired by what he had seen of the student learning centre at the University of California Berkeley, David continued to, in his own words, "wheel and deal" until he succeeded in getting funding equivalent to 0.5 of a full-time position to set up the unit under the umbrella of the Counselling Service where he worked. The rest, as they say, is history: the unit that David set up quickly became the model upon which many other tertiary institutions in New Zealand set up and developed their own learning support provisions. David was even invited across the Tasman to advise some Australian universities, like the University of New South Wales, on the establishment of their own learning support centres.

Up until his resignation from the Student Learning Centre in 1992 to pursue other opportunities in Europe, David continued to be innovative and a pioneer in the area of tertiary learning support. He established, for example, targeted learning support for Maori and Pacific Islands students staffed by Maori and Pacific Islands high achieving senior students - well ahead of mentoring programs becoming fashionable in New Zealand universities. Te Puni Wananga and Fale Pasifika, these programs that David established within the Student Learning Centre, were specifically cited when an award was presented to the Centre last year for Sustained Excellence in EO (Equal Opportunities). Further details of David's contributions to the development of tertiary student learning support provision can be found in Professor Nicholas Tarling's book, Auckland: The Modern University (published in 1999 by the University of Auckland), and Dr Josta van Rij-Heyliger's Doctor of Education thesis Globalisation and Pluri-scalar Orchestrations in Higher Education: Locating The University of Auckland's Student Learning Centre Historically and Globally (The University of Auckland, 2005).

A memorial service will be held for David at the Maclaurin Chapel at the University of Auckland on Saturday April 15, 2006 at 3 pm.

July 08, 2005  Emmanuel and Marcus go to Beijing

Emmanuel Manalo (University of Auckland) and Marcus Henning (Auckland University of Technology) recently returned from presenting papers at the Diversity Conference held in Beijing. Emmanuel's paper (co-written with Julie Trafford, also from the University of Auckland) discussed the views of tertiary learning advisors about learning diversity, and Marcus' paper described the results of an evaluation of a course for students with disabilities. Both papers have been submitted for publication consideration in The International Journal of Diversity in Organisations, Communities & Nations.












April 11, 2005  WHAKAMARAMA I TE TIRITI O WAITANGI - Understanding the Treaty of Waitangi

We wrote a small book about the Treaty in 1990 as part of our honouring of the 150 year anniversary of the signing of the Treaty. It was designed to be a book for adult new readers of English - we had identified a gap in the literature because all of the writing of the Treaty was quite hard to read. The book was popular among quite a wide variety of people especially in education - from intermediate schools to English language classrooms. However, we believed that reading in the mother tongue might alert people more to the subtlety of the differences between the two texts of the Treaty which have led to many disputes over the past years. Consequently, in 2003 we published a version of the book in Korean and in 2005, in Chinese and Traditional Chinese.





May 18, 2004  New Home for Te Tari A-whina, the Learning Development Centre at Auckland University of Technology
From February 2004, Te Tari A-whina has been operating out of new premises in the Learning Centre Building on the Wellesley Campus which houses the Library, Conference Centre, Exhibition Space and Self Access Computer Laboratory. The space has room for a Student Drop In Area, Reception and Staff Work Area with six individual offices opening off it. The location is appropriate and students attending the service remark on the pleasant atmosphere, so it is a step up for both profile and conditions of staff and students involved in learning support. Te Tari A-whina has another Drop In Centre in the Business faculty and a new one also over at the Akoranga Campus which comprises a student drop in and individual offices for two staff. In addition, we have Self Access Learning Laboratories in both AUT libraries. In terms of locations, we feel we are much closer to effective premises than we were even last year! We hope to host an Auckland Region ATLAANZ get together sometime before mid year so will keep everyone posted on that!