In response to Salient being online this week, this edition of FM, BM Nius is about the different ways you can contact Ngāi Tauira to get your ideas and thoughts about anything and everything to do with Maori students, and how NT can better provide for YOU while you’re here studying at Victoria University. Boring? Well, I’ll try not to be. This stuff need not be boring. For example, at the end of this article there will be a few questions for you to answer to go into the draw to win a couple of easy movie tickets and a Facebook status update dedicated to YOU. See? Less boring? Good. So let’s get on with it.
Did you know each NT Executive has a staff email? No? Well they do. If you know the first and last name of the Exec member you want to get a hold of—for example Victor Manawatu—then you know their email: Victor.Manawatu@vuw.ac.nz. It’s just got a ‘@vuw.ac.nz’ at the end of it. Easy.
On the other hand, if it’s Ani Racheal McGarvey or Jenna-Faith Allan—they’re the exceptions. What their emails are, I’m not too sure, so to be on the safe side, don’t email them. Just catch up with them at THW or during their office hours.
Next we have the website www.ngaitauira.org.nz. CHECK IT OUT! (Please note it’s ‘org.nz’ not ‘.CO.nz’. It’s ORG as in organisation, not company. And don’t act like you don’t know what I mean…). It’s handy when you want to know what it is that NT actually does for you. There are also pics and links and words and stuff that’s been there since the site was created a year ago now. And sometimes it even gets updated. Like just the other day scholarships information magically appeared. No lies. It happened. I was there.
You can also check out the Exec people from last year and previous years. Compare how times have changed and how they haven’t changed. Maybe. And if you want to email Exec members but don’t know their last name—or even their first—then you can see the list of the names for the current peoples. I say list of names because they don’t actually have their profiles up yet. But another sign of it being updated soon is the fact that at the end of the list of names there’s a sentence that says ‘Profiles coming soon’. Exciting. They might even have Ani/Racheal’s and Jenna-Faith’s email addresses. More exciting.
Another way of getting in on the action that is NT is by adding them as your friend AND group page on Facebook. Yes. Friend AND group page as in, there’s a Ngāi Tauira profile AND a Ngāi Tauira group page. That’s how up with the times they are, Facebook savvy and everything. Go NT.
This is where they post up event pages and invite those in the know to their events like the annual Pō Whakangahau and Sports Days, Study Wānanga and Kapa Haka Noho, etc. When you ‘miss’ the posters hanging up at THW or don’t pay attention to announcements in classes, then maybe during your daily/hourly dose of FB you’ll see an invite to an event pop up. Now that’s handy.
So to reiterate (this is starting to sound a little bit like an essay…), email is firstname.lastname@vuw.ac.nz, website is www.ngaitauira.org.nz, and Facebook pages, you might have noticed, have yet to be told as to where to find them. Why? Because that’s your quest in order to get the movie tickets. Find the pages and 1) find out the status update of the profile page and 2) what the upcoming event is for NT on the group page. Message your email and answers to the NT Facebook profile—group or otherwise—to go into the draw (that means you have to add yourself to the NT profile or group). BUT WAIT! What if you don’t have a Facebook page? (This one’s for you Jamie). Then go on the NT website and name TWO services that NT offers as stated on their website. Here’s some help: They’re all mostly listed on the home page. Send your name and answers in via email to Mariana Whareaitu. Winner will be announced week after next.