Four of Our Own, Whānau Ora Diploma Class of 2025
There is a particular kind of achievement that lives in the early mornings and the late nights, in the assignments completed after the kids were asleep, in the study sessions squeezed between shifts and school runs and everything else life does not pause for. You cannot fully see it in a diploma, though the diploma matters. You see it in the faces of people who chose to keep going when they had every reason not to.
Amber Morunga. Jessica Jerry. Kawhena Howard-Marshall. Lauryn Rhind.
New Zealand Diploma in Whānau Ora, Level 5. Class of 2025.
These four graduates did not step away from their communities to study. They studied while holding them. That is not a small thing. That is, in many ways, the whole point.
WaiTech builds capability that meets people where they are, through the Whānau Ora diploma. Designed for those already doing the mahi.
At the graduation, Chair Evelyn Taumaunu and CEO John Tamihere were present to acknowledge every step of that journey. Because this kind of milestone deserves to be witnessed by leadership that understands what it represents, not just academically, but as a statement about who Waipareira is and what it believes capable people look like.
Te Kauhau Ora. These graduates walked it with everything they had.
Ka mau te wehi ki a koutou.