New Zealand can be Pacific's early childhood education hub, says world's first professor

Aotearoa New Zealand has the potential to become the Pacific's hub for early childhood education, according to the world's first professor in the field, Fa'alogo Aganoa Jacoba Matapo. Matapo, who is also the inaugural Pro Vice Chancellor Pacific at Auckland University of Technology (AUT), believes the nation's 50-year legacy in early childhood education, which began with grassroots efforts in garages and church halls, provides a strong foundation.

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We've got over 50 years of early childhood education legacy in New Zealand, and it started off in garages and church halls and in playgroups, just very grassroots.

Matapo credits pioneers like Teupoko'ina Morgan and Jan Taouma for building Pacific ECE over five decades through community efforts. She emphasized that these leaders, predominantly Pacific women, recognized the value of sustaining language, culture, and identity, connecting them to ancestral lands and villages. This dedication ensured that Pacific children in New Zealand could access these cultural practices as part of their everyday lives.

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I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the legacy of all of our pioneers who actually paved the way before me ... these are, majority are Pacific women.

Her personal commitment to ECE stems from her upbringing, where her mother integrated cultural healing methods into their home. Matapo's career, spanning over 20 years, has been dedicated to Pacific education. After obtaining teaching qualifications and advanced degrees, she has actively contributed to Pacific education, particularly ECE, bridging family ties, cultural connections, and her research work deeply rooted in Pacific communities.

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They're our mātua, our elders, who saw the vision and value of sustaining language, culture, and identity, and the connections, back to ancestral lands and to villages, to sustain that … through their migration to New Zealand and retaining that as part of, a sort of an everyday practice that our Pacific children can access.

However, Matapo stressed that the sector requires ongoing attention and investment to ensure the continued vitality of Pacific languages and cultures. She asserted that cultural grounding provides children with the "strongest start to life." New Zealand's unique position as the first nation with a bicultural curriculum offers a platform to further develop Pacific ECE. Matapo views language learning as additive, stating that a strong foundation in one's first language enhances the ability to learn additional languages and fosters different ways of thinking and understanding the world.

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It started in my home from my own early years, the way in which my mother practised cultural healing methods within our home.