medical school

Language, and more: The challenges for kura Māori students arriving at university

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Raiha Cook grew up attending kura Māori, but when she decided to study at the University of Otago she found the move from te ao Māori to European-style learning difficult. Now she’s researching that transition to help make it easier for students to feel safe at mainstream universities. Set in the spray of Raukawa Moana, … Read more

An affirmative case for Otago medical school’s affirmative action policy

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A legal challenge to the University of Otago’s diversity policy for medical student intake doesn’t deserve to succeed, write Maria Hook, Jane Calderwood Norton and Andrew Geddis This week the Christchurch High Court is hearing a legal challenge to Otago University’s medical school ‘Mirror on Society’ policy, and associated admission scheme. Full details of the … Read more

The Otago med school cap debate began ‘without input from Māori’

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A public health professor at the University of Otago says a debate about capping Māori and Pasifika medical school admissions has come ‘out of the blue’. Te Aniwa Hurihanganui reports for RNZ. Pressure is mounting on the University of Otago Medical School to front up to Māori and Pasifika about a proposal to cap admissions … Read more

Why more Māori professors are essential for Aotearoa’s universities

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The number of Māori academic staff remains disproportionately low at New Zealand universities. Simon Day spoke to three newly appointed Māori professors at the University of Otago about why putting te ao Māori at the centre of their work is so important.  Māori participation in tertiary education is steadily increasing. According to the Ministry of … Read more

Health Sci dropout: What happens when would-be doctors change their minds

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Each year, thousands of students embark on a Bachelor of Health Sciences degree, the first step in any number of challenging healthcare careers including dentistry, pharmacy and medicine. But what happens when you realise Health Sci isn’t for you? This story was first published in the Otago University student magazine Critic Te Arohi. It was … Read more

One family, three generations of Māori doctors

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Jack Tapsell is the product of a family dedicated to the health and wellbeing of Māori. The recent University of Otago medical graduate talks to Leonie Hayden about carrying on the legacy of his father and grandfather. As descendants of Phillip Tapsell, a Danish sailor who settled at Maketū near Rotorua in 1830, and Te Arawa … Read more