The Te Rangihau Scholarship

“Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tuohu koe, me he maunga teitei”

The Tūhoe Waikaremoana Māori Trust Board has had 164 successful recipients for the Te Rangihau Scholarship, with some recipients applying successively until the successful completion of their degree.

The success of those scholarships has been phenomenal with Tūhoe producing graduates in the sciences; mathematics; and business studies; with legal studies and the social sciences still a priority.

In that 10 year period payments of over $400,000 has been distributed to applicants.

BACKGROUND HISTORY

The Te Rangihau Scholarship was first established in 1998 as a joint venture between the Tūhoe Waikaremoana Māori Trust Board and the Department of Social Welfare (now known as the Ministry of Social Development). From 1989 to 1998 the department funded a Rangihau Scholar, placed at Victoria University. The position was part-funded in honour of John Rangihau to commemorate his outstanding service to the department and for his contribution to biculturalism in New Zealand.

The following extract is taken from a review by Professor Leon Fulcher, May 1995, of the Te Rangihau Scholar Initiative entitled: Kaupapa and Outcomes, 1986 – 1996;
Ngai Tūhoe working in partnership with Victoria University & the Department of Social Welfare

The Te Rangihau Scholar initiative was being jointly funded by the Department of Social Welfare in one form or another since 1987. Since 1989, DSW has funded a senior Māori appointment in Social Work and Iwi Development while Victoria University has supported this senior Māori appointment with a tenured wahine Māori Lectureship in Social Work. The Te Rangihau Scholar initiative was established in perpetuity through consultation with te Iwi Ngai Tūhoe, subject to review at the end of each three year period. In 1992, a decision was taken by DSW to build funding for the Te Rangihau Scholar into budget forecasts until 1994/95 when there would be a review.

In a letter from Ms Mazley’s representative Richard Wood, dated 13 April, 1995, the Corporate Office of the Department of Social Welfare sought a written report from the University by the first week of May. This Report will be supplemented by a report prepared for Te Iwi Ngai Tūhoe Pou Temara and submissions from Māori students and representatives of community groups with first hand experience of the benefits accruing from he te Rangihau Scholar initiative. These Reports will form the basis for our contribution to the review and hui with Te Iwi Ngai Tūhoe on 10-11 May 1995 at Mātaatua Marae, Ruatāhuna.

CULTURAL RACISM AND THE DELIVERY OF COMMUNITY SOCIAL SERVICES

Both Victoria University and the Department of Social Welfare have acknowledged the work of John Te Rangiāniwaniwa Rangihau for helping to ensure that a Māori perspective is acknowledged and sustained in the delivery of community social services in New Zealand. The Rangihau’s objective of highlighting problems of cultural racism is seen in Recommendation 1 of Puao-te-Ata-tu recommended to Government as Social Welfare policy in New Zealand to the end of the 20th

Recommendation 1 (Guiding Principles and Objectives)

“To attack all forms of cultural racism in New Zealand that result in the values and lifestyle of the dominant group being regarded as superior to those of other groups, especially Māori, by:

• Providing leadership and programs which help develop a society in which the values of all groups are of central importance to its enhancement; and
• Incorporating the values, cultures and beliefs of the Māori people in all policies developed for the future of New Zealand (DSW,1986:9).”

THE RANGIHAU LEGACY

The legacy Te Rangihau left behind is an important one and at the end of a particularly turbulent period of organisational restructuring in all of New Zealand state services, it is timely to reflect briefly on that legacy. In nomination Rangihau for the award of an honorary degree from Victoria University in 1988, Emeritus Professor John McCreary saluted the career of this distinguished Tūhoe kaumātua and graduate of Victoria University:

“I knew John Rangihau as a student, colleague and friend from 1958 until his death and had ample opportunity to observe him in a wide variety of situations: within his own culture, in our shared culture and in what I would describe as exclusively Pākeha culture. In each of these situations, he not only behaved with distinction but was able to bridge cultures. He was, in some ways, a remarkable phenomenon of bi-culturalism.

An important influence in his life was his passion for reading, developed during the last two years he spent in a sanatorium recovering from TB and almost an equal passion for recording in written form Tūhoe waiata, pātere and haka. John Rangihau gave many Pākeha – both students and other significant people of considerable influence – an insight into Māori culture. In the model of his own person, John Rangihau demonstrated the personal and social values of bicultural living. And yet, at all times, Rangihau was a Māori; asserting his culture and proud of it but never denying the existence and validity of other cultures”.

Rangihau’s early involvement with the university scholarship came through his association with Professor McCreary and Dr Ian Prior in their early scientific work with indigenous people. Rangihau’s subsequent involvement in the work of the Department of Māori Affairs saw the acceptance of his long argued position that Māori development must be Iwi based. These ideas, of which it may be argued John Rangihau was a pioneer exponent, formed the bases for Recommendations 2 – 13 in one of the significant pieces of indigenous social science research to be found anywhere in the world (Pūao-te-Ata-tū, 1986:9-14).

MĀORI DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIAL WORK EDUCATION AT VICTORIA

In a hui held at Ruatāhuna in July, 1988 and at Waikaremoana, Kutarere and Ruātoki in March, 1989 with senior representatives of the Department of Social Welfare and Victoria University, the people of Ngai Tūhoe gave their endorsement of the creation of a Senior Teaching and Research position at Victoria University to be known as the Te Rangihau Scholar. A preliminary report on this action was given to the Council of Victoria University at its March, 1989 meeting. In early April the Director-General of the Department of Social Welfare received a letter from the Tūhoe Waikaremoana Māori Trust Board, copied to the Vice Chancellor, advising that at a meeting on 10 March 1989, the Board unanimously endorsed the nomination of Tamati Cairns as the Te Rangihau Scholar.
The Te Rangihau Scholar was to:

• Help concentrate university teaching on principles and practices of Whānau, Hapū and Iwi Development;
• Perform tasks endorsed by the Tūhoe people, Victoria University and the Department of Social Welfare for a period to be agreed upon by all 3 parties to the partnership;
• Promote Whānau, Hapū and Iwi development as the kaupapa which informs social and community work practice in the Department of Social Welfare and guides professional education for social and community workers at Victoria University;
• Be supported in such a way as to enable their knowledge and skills and qualifications during their period of involvement with Victoria University in such a way as to assist the holder, Ngai Tūhoe and other Iwi to become more self-sufficient in their endeavours.

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