Marcus Akuhata-Brown: What will your contribution be?

Maintaining connections to people and place and having a seven generational focus and perspective were Marcus's central messages. Marcus himself was able to take us back 21 generations through his whakapapa (geneology). He skilfully wove important messages with stories of his ancestors and his life. He swapped seamlessly between Marcus the thinker and academic and Marcus the Maori boy from Te Araroa and kept us mesmerised for 90 minutes.

We all came away feeling refreshed and inspired to think about what we are contributing and how long our contribution will stand for. Marcus encouraged us to ask ourselves, what of our contribution will still be standing in seven generations? I found this to be a very challenging but welcome message. It is easy to get caught up in the petty grievances and offences and lose sight of the important work that we are all  doing here - building a community for the future and exploring the future of education. Important work, indeed!