November 25, 2015
Support call for first in family students
Maori university students are three times more likely to be studying humanities or education subjects than they are commerce or science.
That’s one of the results coming out of the Graduate Longitudinal Study New Zealand being done by Otago University.
The study is tracking 8700 graduates, including 600 Maori graduates, to see the benefits people get from higher education.
Lead author Dr Reremoana Theodore says nearly half of recent Maori graduates are the first in their immediate family to attend university, one third are parents and 70 per cent are female.
She says being first in the whanau can be hard.
"You sort of get there and it's a bit overwhelming. And it might not be what you're use too, especially if you're not from Tamaki Makaurau, or you're not from a big city. We need to be more mindful of when these students are coming into university what some of those obstacles or barriers might be for them to be succeeding," she says.
Dr Theodore says Maori graduates say they want to make a difference in the Maori community and in society.
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