With an increasing number of international students worldwide seeking higher education from a wide range of cultural backgrounds, post-secondary institutions are increasingly diverse, and many are facing emerging challenges due to new levels of cultural complexity. International students, or those from migrant backgrounds, may find it particularly difficult to navigate the social, cultural, and academic world abroad.

This workshop will explore teaching and learning strategies applied in a tertiary institute in New Zealand, which prioritizes strong reciprocal relationships with students to develop their sense of belonging in culturally diverse classrooms. The facilitator will share Māori models of well-being and kaupapa Māori approaches, which means informed by tikanga Māori, or Māori ways of doing things. Participants will focus on how these approaches may be adapted to teaching and learning environments at the University of Windsor and other institutions of higher education.

Māori are the indigenous people of Aotearoa New Zealand, and their rights are upheld under Te Tiriti o Waitangi (the Treaty of Waitangi).