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Article scientifique

Indigenous Higher Education. Maori Experience in New Zealand.

While there are significant differences in the circumstances of indigenous peoples in various parts of the world, there are also commonalities in experiences and world-views. Māori experience has not been substantially different from other indigenous peoples except in three important respects. First Māori demographic patterns are distinctive. Around fourteen percent of the total New Zealand population is Māori and the percentage is likely to rise to around twenty percent by 2051. Second the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi has created a special relationship between Māori and the Crown with implications for education policy. Though largely ignored for some twelve decades after it was signed, and still a point of contention for some political parties, since 1975 the Treaty has come to occupy a more central position in New Zealand’s constitutional conventions. Third there has been effective Māori leadership in education for more than a century, initially the result of a deliberate effort by one school to promote engagement in university study.