Kia ora koutou, Salam,

Celebrating all women on International Women’s Day!

We are doing a series of celebrating all women in Aotearoa through the week on our social media. The first International Women’s Day was celebrated on March 8, 1914 leading to this day was a series of campaigns for women’s rights to work, vote access education, hold public office, and to end discrimination.

Please follow our stories on these amazing wahine on our

Facebook:InclusiveAotearoaCollective and

Instagram:@inclusive_aotearoa_collective to celebrate their journey!

We have a new website!

After a couple of months of planning, we are delighted to announce the launch of our newly redesigned website. We wanted a new website to reflect our development, and our existing website could no longer keep up, so it was time for a change. Last year, our amazing Tim Foote took on the role to collaborate and create a new and improved website with help of our web desiger (Meghan), web developer (Trent) and Access Advisors’ help (Chandra). The team at IACT has supported Tim, so it was a wonderful team effort!

We value your opinion, so please contact us to let us know what you think of our new website as all comments and feedback are welcome. Please also let us know if you cannot find something or make any suggestions for further information or topics.

Let us walk you through the new feel of the website!

Our Tauparapara

Associate Professor Tom Roa (Ngāti Maniapoto, Waikato) has kindly gifted the below whakataukī to Inclusive Aotearoa Collective Tāhono. In writing it, he was inspired by the toroa (albatross), a symbol of peace. The tauparapara tracks the toroa as it soars across the seas to its nesting sites inland, and how it sews offshore and onshore together in its flight. We are very thankful for the support, guidance and aroha from Professor Tom Roa.

Why we asked about belonging

To feel like you belong, you need to be able to be your whole self. Belonging means feeling accepted and included, and not feeling discriminated against or excluded.

We asked about belonging because we wanted to understand what helps people belong, what gets in the way of belonging, and find out what work is needed to create a society where everyone feels valued.

You will find our journey and who we visited and where and what we discovered. Please review our story here.

Our Resources

We have several resources that you can access, so please take the time to review our website.

Mapping Directory

We’ve put together a mapping directory of groups and organisations working in the Belonging and Inclusion space which can be found on our website here (make sure you scroll down the page and select the region). If you would like to be included in this directory it’s not too late. Please send your organisation’s contact details to Talie at [email protected].

Tools for getting started!

We have a number of tools on our website to assist with your journey.

• Inclusive Aotearoa – Guide for how to have a conversation on belonging
• The Voice of Racism
• For those wanting to understand how racism impacts everyday New Zealanders.
• AWEA – Education for social justice
• Conversations starters for discussions about how we can work as allies.
• The Citizen’s Handbook
• Ten-part video comedy series that shares ideas about what we can do as citizens.

In the News and Upcoming Events

You will also find our latest news in the media and upcoming events.

News:

• RNZ: Nine To Noon – A snapshot of belonging in Aotearoa
• Stuff: Towards a country where everyone has a place to belong
• Stuff: More than 800 commit to researching for anti-hate strategy
• Allied Justice NZ: Women In Leadership l Anjum Rahman: In Pursuit Of Building A Socially Inclusive Aotearoa

Events:

Anjum will be presenting this year at Earthbeat this year, and her session will be held on Saturday, 20th March from 1.00 pm – 2.30 pm. For more information click here.

If you have any upcoming events and you would like us to share, please, send them through to [email protected].