On Wednesday 26 November 2022 the Year 7 & 8 Whiria te Tangata Speech final took place at Riverhead School during the day and the Year 5 & 6 final was held at Scott Point School in the evening. Each event hosted 14 finalists and the calibre of presentations was mind-blowing. 

​

Our judges for the Year 7 & 8 competition, an HOD of English/Drama (Rebecca Chamley) and teacher of English/Drama (Michael McSweeney) from Massey High School, an English teacher (Raegan O’Malley) and a Year 13 student from Hobsonville Point Secondary, plus our celebrity - radio and TV presenter Nathan Rawere felt the future of our world was in terrific hands with such articulate, entertaining and thoughtful speeches. The judges for the Year 5 & 6 competition, our 2 Massey High School judges from the morning were joined by English teacher (Ros Britten) and Social Sciences teacher (Aidan Daly) from Hobsonville Point Secondary School who also expressed how impressive the tokomauri, passion students were projecting through their speech presentations.

​

The judges gave amazing feedback based on the APPA Rua Tai competition rubrics. Nathan giving a full-blown lesson on public speaking and encouraged them all to continue with the tough mahi they had engaged in to be finalists of such great calibre. In 2023 we will align our Whitia te Tangata Speech competition with the APPA Rua Tai event so we can send representatives to an Auckland final following ours next year. 

​

We look forward to the range and similar high standard in 2023!