Kura kaupapa Māori brings home top US literacy prize and $166k

Hohepa Campbell (left) outside the Library of Congress. Photo? Supplied, Hohepa Campbell
By RNZ
Kura kaupapa Māori have won a prize of US$100,000 at the Library of Congress Literacy Awards in Washington DC.
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori – the body which overseas more than 60 schools across Aotearoa – is bringing the Kislak Family Foundation Prize and the prize money which equates to roughly NZ$166,000, back to Aotearoa.
The prize – the second biggest of the awards – is awarded to an organisation based either inside or outside of the United States with an outsized impact on literacy.
Te Rūnanga Nui kaitakawaenga (chief executive) Hohepa Campbell said the rūnanga was excited to receive the prize and proud to meet with their benefactors in DC.
“It’s a fantastic opportunity and we’re really pleased to come to Washington DC to meet the family as well as the people who organise this event on an annual basis at the US Library of Congress.”
It was an exciting prospect and the executive council of Te Rūnanga had met to discuss what to do with the prize money, Campbell said.
“We are planning to invest that money and set that money aside so that we can establish an enduring scholarship fund to support students or graduates of kura kaupapa Māori who may be doing work in this area, in the revitalisation of te reo Māori.”
‘It’s okay for us to do it differently’
Earlier this year the Government announced that it expected all public schools to teach students to read in a “proven structured literacy approach”.
Campbell said when it came to teaching te reo, reading was important but having an ability to speak the language was the most important part of any language programme in the classroom.
“Structured language for us in the kura starts when tamariki wake up in the morning, have their kai with their parents in te reo Māori, come to kura speaking te reo Māori, telling jokes with each other in te reo Māori, coming into the gates saying hello and speaking to their friends in te reo Māori.
“So it really is important for us that our tamariki are speaking te reo Māori all day and every day.”
The oral language needed to be at the heart of their structured literacy programme, he said.
“We have always had an oral language and it’s vital that we keep that at the centre of te reo, but having said that, oral language can be supported by reading [and] writing.”
Things like songs and tikanga (custom) can be used to support children in the classroom, he said.
“We have our waiata, the waiata are really important to us, our mōteatea or our waiata tawhito, that’s the oral language our tūpuna used to pass down the generations.”
Campbell said they were now starting to see the success of kura kaupapa Māori, where intergenerational transmission of the language was occurring.
If the next generation of Māori children could speak te reo every day that would be at the centre for the revitalisation of te reo in Māori communities, he said.
“It’s okay for us to do it differently and we should be proud of what we’re doing because the results speak for themselves.”