Manurewa community icon Shirley Maihi is the country's oldest school principal.
At 80, she leads decile one Finlayson Park School, championing bi-lingual education and social wellbeing initiatives, including being an early adopter of offering free breakfasts and lunches.
She has been with the school for 35 years and began teaching 55 years ago. She’s even taught the grandparents of some current pupils.
Her devotion to education has previously been recognised with a Queens Service Medal.
Principal of Finlayson Park School, Shirley Maihi Photo: RNZ Pacific / Sela Jane Hopgood
Maihi tells Kathryn Ryan she would dearly miss being part of a wider whānau if she wasn’t working at a school.
“I've always wanted to be a teacher, right from when I got out of school, so my thinking has never changed in that. I love children, I love supporting whānau, offering wraparound services.
“I mean the whole wellbeing of the child is so important to me that that does keep the energy going.”
She was also ahead of her time when in the early 1990s she introduced free school breakfasts and lunches to help struggling tamariki continue to learn.
“In many cases in those days, parents were too whakamā, too shy, to tell us that they didn't have these things and therefore they kept their children at home and that was really the catalyst that made us think we have to do something about this more seriously.
“So with the help of a variety of agencies in the community and our teachers providing ingredients, we decided we'd put on breakfast in the morning and then we would do a hot lunch or some catchy lunch at lunchtime as well.”
Right up to this day, classrooms are fitted with toasters, microwaves, a little oven, and electric kettles, and it’s all free of charge without restrictions on tamariki, she says.
“Our parents also are now quite used to how things operate in our school … [they’re] coming forward and letting us know, and that's what we want because we've got to support our families at home so that our children can get to school and learn.
“This is who we are, and I think all schools are at that realisation now that this is what actually needs to happen, and it's not easy. It's not easy to do because we're not funded for that.
“I mean at the moment, we're very fortunate we are now onto the free lunches from the government scheme … But up until then, and for other things that have to go on in the school to make it happen, we are funding it ourselves.”
Maihi also believes in the importance of nurturing first languages and her primary became the first state school to be in a te reo Māori immersion programme.
“There was no Kura Kaupapa at those days in Manurewa or within easy access in South Auckland and yet there were five kohanga reo who had graduates needing to go into an immersion unit and had nowhere to go.
“We were approached by kohanga reo movement to see if we could accommodate that.
“We thought well look this is a great opportunity for us to nurture the language and continue it on in the learning. So that's how we initially started and that was in 1989.”
The Māori unit blossomed at the school, which now has 950 pupils representing 24 ethnicities, and five different learning pathways have evolved, including Samoan and Tongan immersion units.
“It is criminal to cut off a child's first language. They must be able to come to school and use it, feel safe in it, feel valued for it,” Maihi says.
“They can benefit themselves, their self-esteem, their knowledge of both worlds, their ability to move in and out of their own cultures so much more freely if they've got the language. So there's a lot of thought and pedagogy learning going on behind establishing these units and each one is unique to itself really.”
Keeping in mind her philosophy of a triangular relationship between the parents, school, and children, she set up a programme to support parents’ literacy and life skills, established an early childhood centre nearby, and a ‘schoolhouse’ for her teachers to live in with little rent.
“I think that's been the real catalyst for my passion is to see the passion being developed in these hard-working people [the staff].
“But also I think, and I hope, that they see that I'm valuing what they contribute, so I think this actually helps you to get through the harder times. You've got people around you who you can share with, you can plan innovatively with, and you can look for new strategies to support perhaps the downs until it becomes an up.”
The responsibility of ensuring her efforts remain at the school is one of her key missions before retirement, she says.
“Two years ago, we applied to ask for the school to be a designated special character school and it was turned down by the ministry and then Covid hit, so we're just reinvigorating our application again to ask for that.
“I think we don't want to lose what's here and that's my main issue. If it was a designated character school, then I could happily retire, so yeah. I just want to make sure that things are going and will continue to go before I go.”
