Leading For Equity: An SBT Learning Event

Springboard Trust is thrilled to announce its 2020 learning event – Leading for Equity.  

September 9-10, 1pm until 4:30pm

This year, COVID-19 has exacerbated some of the starkest inequities in our society. From device access to family income, the gap between those who have and those who have not is made all too clear under these conditions.  

As an educational change organisation, Springboard Trust aims to set the standard for educational leadership that recognises these inequities, and builds strong practice to create fair and inclusive conditions for all.  

This event will feature a range of speakers, focused on topics around equitable leadership in education and supporting all schools and communities:

• Russell Bishop, Teaching to the North-East

• Pasi Sahlberg, International perspectives on leading for equity

• Laurayne Tafa, Equity as a measurement of leadership

• Michelle Johansson, Advice for teachers of young brown scholars

• Pete Jones, Maurie Abraham, Tom Davison, Secondary principals panel

• Donal Maclean, Dealing with trauma - schools as safe spaces

We also have a panel featuring some of Springboard's corporate partners: Fonterra, Genesis and KPMG, as well as charitable trust KidsCan This session will give you the opportunity to learn more about cross-sector initiatives for schools and communities, and will include time for school leaders to share community partnerships they have developed.

Finally, the Wednesday 3:30pm session is a separate panel - a joint presentation from both Springboard Trust and our partner ASB, titled COVID-19: Economic and Financial realities. You can register for free for this session here.

Hosted virtually by Springboard Trust, all sessions will take place on the 9th and 10th of September, running between 1pm and 4:30pm.  

We hope to see you there!

How the virtual conference works

1. Get a ticket for Leading for Equity through Eventbrite, and register for the ASB and Springboard Trust session!

2. Before the event, the Springboard Trust team will be in touch with all ticket holders so they can choose their preferred sessions and receive links to the virtual conference rooms for Wednesday and Thursday.

3. Get comfortable, and join us for an electric couple of days!

Leading for Equity: Our Speakers

Emeritus Professor Russell Bishop, ONZM (Keynote speaker)

Teaching to the North-East

There will be few schools that don’t have in their charter documents or statement of goals, their aim to promote excellence for all learners while reducing educational disparities in their institution. The problem is that this rarely happens. However, it does happen in what I have come to call “North-East” schools.

North-East schools support the learning of those students who have been marginalised educationally. They prioritise relationships; creating a strong caring and learning relational context for learning is understood to be fundamental to everybody being able to do their jobs effectively, be they the principal, a middle manager or a teacher.

Suggested pre-conference reading. Chapter 8 of Teaching to the North-East: Relationship-based Learning in Practice. NZCER Press. 

Pasi Sahlberg, Gonski Institute for Education (Keynote speaker)

International perspectives on leading for equity

Pasi Sahlberg is a Professor of Education Policy and Research Director at the Gonski Institute for Education of the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney. He has worked as a schoolteacher, teacher-educator, policy advisor and director general at the Ministry of Education in Finland. He has held senior education specialist posts in World Bank and European Commission analysing and supporting education systems around the world, and as a visiting professor at Harvard University.

Laurayne Tafa, Education Consultant, former principal and board chair

Equity as a measurement of leadership

COVID-19 has only exposed the historical and unacceptable inequities that have existed for generations and they are still there regardless of a global pandemic or moving alert levels and for those experiencing this inequity in their daily lives, it is hardly unprecedented times!   

Education should be an equity accelerant – what leadership decisions lead to accelerating equity?

Michelle Johansson, Kāuru Kura at Ako Mātātapu: Teach First NZ

Advice for teachers of young brown scholars

Michelle is a Polynesian educator, theatre-maker, mother and former high school dropout. She serves as Kāuru Kura|Head of School at Ako Mātātupu: Teach First NZ, growing exceptional people to teach in low-decile schools. She is also the Creative Director of the Black Friars theatre company who are determined to hold courageous spaces of meaningful appearance, culturally, ecologically, and politically for their community. The company works to re-story Pasifika in the largest Polynesian city in the world, to activate our heritage literacies, to grow future leaders and to hold courageous spaces for our young people to walk tall in both of their worlds. 

Donal McLean, Principal, Fruitvale School

Dealing with trauma - schools as safe spaces for students and families

Donal is currently working inside his school and alongside WAPA, and numerous other organisations, in a number of programmes of work designed to create better outcomes for whanau/fanau and their traumatised tamariki.  Collaboration is the key to systemic change and WAPA and the West is an incredibly innovative organisation and place to collaborate. 

He is the father of 4 gorgeous young women and married to another, loves cycling, reading and chocolate, especially Whittakers Dark series. Working on the edge of change and creating solutions alongside others that make other's lives better energises Donal’s day and his life.  

Secondary Principals Panel

Pete Jones, Manurewa High School | Tom Davison, Okaihau College | Maurie Abraham, Hobsonville Point Secondary School

Principals will be giving their perspective, challenges and key mahi as Principal of schools including the largest decile 1 school in NZ, rural schools and schools with some of the largest student populations of Maori & Pasifika students, as they work to challenge the traditional systems and measures of success. 

Corporate initiatives supporting schools and communities

Springboard Trust partners' panel

Vania Martins-Fouche, Fonterra | Jenny Burke, Genesis | Mark Thomas, KPMG | Julianne McMillan, KPMG | Julie Chapman, CEO of KidsCan

Our partners cover initiatives that they work on with schools, from the Kickstart Breakfast Programme and providing STEM equipment and resources to schools, to dedicated partnerships with schools that have lasted more than a decade.