I highly recommend these books by Russell Bishop which very clearly present the rationale and evidence behind culturally responsive practice, the positive impact relationships within a school setting have on learning and attendance, collaboration between teachers and school leaders at a systems level, and the critical importance of culture. 

It puts out the challenge for us as educators to review our teaching methods and ways of engaging students that surely match our most fundamental goals as educators. 

It is heartening to see that Te Ara Whakamana aligns well with much of what Russell Bishop is saying in these important books: culturally centred, strengths based, agentic approach with strong Mana Teams and distributed leadership to ensure robust implementation for long term sustainable and equitable outcomes. 

There are also many salient lessons on key aspects of training, implementation, thinking and leading from a systems level, and how politics can either support this knowledge and research, or sadly, ignore and fail to support and provide resourcing.  

Nigel Marshall, Ako Solutionz Director

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