Harper Johnson, Kelsey Dykun, Shayna Moore, and PINE director Rhonda Cambell learn traditional healing practices in New Zealand.
New Zealand visit transformative for Indigenous UM nursing students
A knowledge exchange trip to New Zealand in 2024 was life-changing for Shayna Moore, a recent graduate from the College of Nursing in the Rady Faculty of Health Sciences who now works as a skills education coach for Indigenous students in the program.
Not only did she learn about the culture of that country’s Indigenous people, but she also returned more in touch with her own.
“The first month after I came back, I learned how to make moccasins. I also learned beadwork. It really inspired me to come back and learn more about my culture,” said Moore, a member of Pimicikamak Cree Nation who grew up in Thompson, Man.
Last summer, Moore was one of six Indigenous UM nursing students who travelled to New Zealand for two weeks to learn with and from Māori nursing colleagues in partnership with Whitireia New Zealand’s Māori bachelor of nursing program.
The Turtle Island and Aotearoa program – named after the traditional Indigenous and Māori names for North America and New Zealand – was organized through Mahkwa omushki kiim: Pathway to Indigenous Nursing Education (PINE), the college’s support network for First Nations, Métis and Inuit nursing students.
Back row (L-R): Ngāti Toa Club Whaea coach, students Justice Spence, Shayna Moore, Harper Johnson, and Jordan Braun
Front row (L-R): Kelsey Dykun and Katherine Kwartel
The experience was fully funded for students by Global Skills Opportunity, a Government of Canada program, in partnership with UM, with wraparound support funding from First Nations Health and Social Secretariat of Manitoba (FNHSSM).
Barbara Rose-Lovett, director of the skills and simulation centres at the College of Nursing, led the initiative along with PINE director Rhonda Campbell. They were joined by Dr. Wanda Phillips-Beck, Indigenous Research Chair in Nursing for the Manitoba Region at FNHSSM, Anishinaabe Knowledge Keeper Sherri Copenace, student advisor Marla Robson and research assistant Bekelu Negash.
Rose-Lovett said the trip was a unique experience for PINE students to meet with other Indigenous students in the global community and create awareness for them about global health. She noted there are many parallels between the two colonized cultures, and that a lot was learned from the Māori nursing leaders and students regarding their path towards reconciliation.
“New Zealand’s Māori renaissance began in the 1970s, and it was a real pivot to reclaim their culture and language,” she said.
“The potential actions that come out of an experience such as this have a profound opportunity to ripple effect and lead to changes here at home as we take steps towards reconciliation.”
The students took part in several cultural and knowledge sharing activities, including traditional Māori healing practices and learning from a national coach The to paddle a waka ama – a canoe traditionally used by New Zealand’s Pacific people.
They also experienced the Whitireia classrooms and how local Indigenous cultures are embedded into the programming.
“Their classrooms are not organized like our traditional classrooms. The instructors don’t stand at a podium – they walk among the students,” Phillips-Beck said. “They also share a meal together every day, they sing together and have a mantra that is recited daily about the responsibilities of being a nurse. It’s a really different experience.”
Phillips-Beck and Campbell both said they could see a change in the students from the meaningful connections they made.
“They were flourishing right before our eyes. They were shy at first, but within days they were confident and speaking proudly of who they are,” Campbell said.
All of the students are now graduates of the bachelor of nursing program. In February, Moore returned to the college to work part-time in the PINE unit. In addition to tutoring Indigenous students in the skills lab, she facilitates a blanket exercise for Indigenous and non-Indigenous students in the first and sixth terms of the nursing program.
“Being part of PINE allowed me to learn more about my culture, but it was really New Zealand that solidified it. Just talking to the people there and sharing in their ceremonies – they were so open to us being there.”