title: Māori education as justice and reckoning

authors: Hemi, Keakaokawai Varner

abstract: Hypothetical musings on what constitutes justice have been taking place at least since the ancient Greek philosopher Plato recorded the above debate between Socrates and Cephalus in Republic circa 380 BCE. Modem philosophical notions of justice have also often been heady stuff relying on heuristic "device[ s] of representation"², "thick and thin"³ theories and other abstract conceptions to untangle real-world inequalities. In comparison, current questions of access to justice are earthy, grunty and real. Increasingly vociferous access to justice claims cite the actual injustice-laden histories of particular groups, speak in terms of harm already inflicted and call for reparative, restorative or healing justice. Indigenous peoples, African-Americans and other disenfranchised, excluded and oppressed groups quote dates, casualty numbers and the legislative section or treaty responsible. For many indigenous people, any single incident is always just one among many in the collective memory; there are always more dates, cases,⁴ facts and figures in the "litany of injustices"⁵ which evidence denial of justice. Gritty statistics in one area of well-being flow into another and over generations. This is justice in the trenches, a place where numbers and statistics are what they are.

text: Māori education as justice and reckoning Hypothetical musings on what constitutes justice have been taking place at least since the ancient Greek philosopher Plato recorded the above debate between Socrates and Cephalus in Republic circa 380 BCE. Modem philosophical notions of justice have also often been heady stuff relying on heuristic "device[ s] of representation"², "thick and thin"³ theories and other abstract conceptions to untangle real-world inequalities. In comparison, current questions of access to justice are earthy, grunty and real. Increasingly vociferous access to justice claims cite the actual injustice-laden histories of particular groups, speak in terms of harm already inflicted and call for reparative, restorative or healing justice. Indigenous peoples, African-Americans and other disenfranchised, excluded and oppressed groups quote dates, casualty numbers and the legislative section or treaty responsible. For many indigenous people, any single incident is always just one among many in the collective memory; there are always more dates, cases,⁴ facts and figures in the "litany of injustices"⁵ which evidence denial of justice. Gritty statistics in one area of well-being flow into another and over generations. This is justice in the trenches, a place where numbers and statistics are what they are.

year: 2017

title: What Do Secondary School Rugby Players Think About Concussion?

authors: Murphy, Karen Jane

subjects: rugby

abstract: Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a dominant and growing public health concern globally. Sport is an arena in which people are at high risk of TBI. In New Zealand the popular sport of rugby is played by many, particularly during school years. These school aged players are at particular risk of TBI because of the contact nature of the sport and the maturational stage of the brain which is still developing during the teenage years.  Moves to increase safety depend on an awareness of what these players know about TBI and their attitude towards TBI.
A sample of 456 secondary school rugby players in New Zealand were surveyed to gather information about their knowledge of, and attitude towards concussion. Rugby union and rugby league playing participants were mainly recruited through direct contact with schools. Participants were invited to access the survey online or could complete a paper copy. The survey was made up of items which had already been used in previous studies and this allowed for a comparison of findings with previous research. Some items related to knowledge of concussion while others related to attitude towards concussion, in particular attitudes to returning to play following concussion.
	Participants had good knowledge of symptoms, and almost all participants knew there was a risk to long term health and a risk of death if a second concussion was sustained before a first concussion had healed. However, there were some gaps in knowledge about treatment and recovery time.
Participants self-reported attitudes to concussion were consistently and significantly safer than the attitudes they predicted ‘most players’ would hold.
More than half of the participants had a relatively safe attitude to all but one of the items relating to concussion attitude. The least safe attitudes were around who should make a decision to returning to play after concussion and the safety of attitudes declined as the importance of a rugby match increased. 
Ethnicity consistently influenced knowledge and attitude on all the measures used within the survey. Those identifying as Māori ethnicity scored lower on all knowledge and attitude scales than those identifying as Pakeha ethnicity. Self-rated knowledge of concussion and the number of concussions experienced also had a positive effect on knowledge of concussion. 
There are several educational tools and regulatory documents aimed at minimising the incidence, severity and outcome of concussion in rugby but there is little research guiding how these resources are tailored to their intended audience in the secondary school population. Also, little is known about the gaps in knowledge and understanding of concussion in this population. It is tentatively stated that the findings from this study could be used to inform strategies which are aimed at increasing knowledge and making attitudes safer in secondary school rugby players in New Zealand.

text: What Do Secondary School Rugby Players Think About Concussion? Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a dominant and growing public health concern globally. Sport is an arena in which people are at high risk of TBI. In New Zealand the popular sport of rugby is played by many, particularly during school years. These school aged players are at particular risk of TBI because of the contact nature of the sport and the maturational stage of the brain which is still developing during the teenage years.  Moves to increase safety depend on an awareness of what these players know about TBI and their attitude towards TBI.
A sample of 456 secondary school rugby players in New Zealand were surveyed to gather information about their knowledge of, and attitude towards concussion. Rugby union and rugby league playing participants were mainly recruited through direct contact with schools. Participants were invited to access the survey online or could complete a paper copy. The survey was made up of items which had already been used in previous studies and this allowed for a comparison of findings with previous research. Some items related to knowledge of concussion while others related to attitude towards concussion, in particular attitudes to returning to play following concussion.
	Participants had good knowledge of symptoms, and almost all participants knew there was a risk to long term health and a risk of death if a second concussion was sustained before a first concussion had healed. However, there were some gaps in knowledge about treatment and recovery time.
Participants self-reported attitudes to concussion were consistently and significantly safer than the attitudes they predicted ‘most players’ would hold.
More than half of the participants had a relatively safe attitude to all but one of the items relating to concussion attitude. The least safe attitudes were around who should make a decision to returning to play after concussion and the safety of attitudes declined as the importance of a rugby match increased. 
Ethnicity consistently influenced knowledge and attitude on all the measures used within the survey. Those identifying as Māori ethnicity scored lower on all knowledge and attitude scales than those identifying as Pakeha ethnicity. Self-rated knowledge of concussion and the number of concussions experienced also had a positive effect on knowledge of concussion. 
There are several educational tools and regulatory documents aimed at minimising the incidence, severity and outcome of concussion in rugby but there is little research guiding how these resources are tailored to their intended audience in the secondary school population. Also, little is known about the gaps in knowledge and understanding of concussion in this population. It is tentatively stated that the findings from this study could be used to inform strategies which are aimed at increasing knowledge and making attitudes safer in secondary school rugby players in New Zealand.

year: 2015

title: The spatial variability of elemental and isotopic compositions of carbon and nitrogen within sediments in a subtropical mangrove forest

authors: Ramirez-Matiz, Yuliana

subjects: Carbon

abstract: Mangrove forests are coastal habitats, which provide numerous ecosystem services in tropical and temperate regions, including burial and storage of Carbon and Nitrogen in the sediments. In New Zealand mangrove coverage is rapidly expanding throughout muddy coastlines and estuaries, in direct contrast to the current global trend of declining mangrove coverage. In this thesis, we explore the spatial distribution of Carbon and Nitrogen content and isotopic compositions in the sediments of a mangrove forest in New Zealand.

The field site is the Firth of Thames mangrove forest, which has rapidly expanded since around 1950, and now reaches 1 km in width over the southern Firth. Sediment cores with lengths ranging from 34 to 40 cm were collected from twelve across-shore transects and two along-shore transects. At each location, samples were taken from the surface and at depth, resulting in a total of 175 samples, providing substantial spatial coverage across the forest. A number of samples of mangrove vegetation were also collected. Elemental and isotopic analyses were performed on the sediment and vegetation samples. Additionally, grain size, fluorometric determination of Chlorophyll-a pigments and loss on ignition analyses were made on a selected subset of sediment samples. The elemental analyses in sediments showed mean concentrations of 2.09%, 1.59%, and 0.23% of total carbon, organic carbon and nitrogen, respectively, with generally larger concentrations at the surface. The C:N ratios were much larger from tree tissue samples (mean 38.01) relative to sediments (mean of 6.83). The mean δ13C and δ15N values in sediments were -23.04‰ and 8.20‰, respectively, while the mangrove samples were 13C-depleted (mean of -26.89‰) and exhibited a wide range in the Nitrogen isotope composition (values from 4.89-11.94‰).

Surface sediment samples showed a progressive increase of N, C and OC towards the interior of the mangrove forest, a decrease in δ13C values, but no clear spatial pattern was discerned in the depth samples. Despite some scatter, δ15N values were relatively constant in the across-shore direction. The elemental and isotopic concentration in the sediments did not appear to be affected on a large scale by the freshwater discharge, which locally influenced only the concentrations within the sediments on the adjacent riverbanks. Relatively high δ13C values and low C: N ratios indicate the predominance of an allochthonous marine source for carbon in FoT mangrove sediments. Neither algal biomass nor grain size were found to be correlated with OC content in the Firth of Thames sediments. A gross estimate (integrated over the top 10 cm) of C and N stocks was 13.26 t C ha-1 and 1.47 t N ha-1, respectively, thus adding to the recognition of these forests as efficient carbon and nitrogen sinks.

This research contributes to the knowledge of C and N content, sources and burial patterns in subtropical mangrove sediments. Such information is required to underpin environmental management decisions, for example prior to undertaking restoration or removal projects.

text: The spatial variability of elemental and isotopic compositions of carbon and nitrogen within sediments in a subtropical mangrove forest Mangrove forests are coastal habitats, which provide numerous ecosystem services in tropical and temperate regions, including burial and storage of Carbon and Nitrogen in the sediments. In New Zealand mangrove coverage is rapidly expanding throughout muddy coastlines and estuaries, in direct contrast to the current global trend of declining mangrove coverage. In this thesis, we explore the spatial distribution of Carbon and Nitrogen content and isotopic compositions in the sediments of a mangrove forest in New Zealand.

The field site is the Firth of Thames mangrove forest, which has rapidly expanded since around 1950, and now reaches 1 km in width over the southern Firth. Sediment cores with lengths ranging from 34 to 40 cm were collected from twelve across-shore transects and two along-shore transects. At each location, samples were taken from the surface and at depth, resulting in a total of 175 samples, providing substantial spatial coverage across the forest. A number of samples of mangrove vegetation were also collected. Elemental and isotopic analyses were performed on the sediment and vegetation samples. Additionally, grain size, fluorometric determination of Chlorophyll-a pigments and loss on ignition analyses were made on a selected subset of sediment samples. The elemental analyses in sediments showed mean concentrations of 2.09%, 1.59%, and 0.23% of total carbon, organic carbon and nitrogen, respectively, with generally larger concentrations at the surface. The C:N ratios were much larger from tree tissue samples (mean 38.01) relative to sediments (mean of 6.83). The mean δ13C and δ15N values in sediments were -23.04‰ and 8.20‰, respectively, while the mangrove samples were 13C-depleted (mean of -26.89‰) and exhibited a wide range in the Nitrogen isotope composition (values from 4.89-11.94‰).

Surface sediment samples showed a progressive increase of N, C and OC towards the interior of the mangrove forest, a decrease in δ13C values, but no clear spatial pattern was discerned in the depth samples. Despite some scatter, δ15N values were relatively constant in the across-shore direction. The elemental and isotopic concentration in the sediments did not appear to be affected on a large scale by the freshwater discharge, which locally influenced only the concentrations within the sediments on the adjacent riverbanks. Relatively high δ13C values and low C: N ratios indicate the predominance of an allochthonous marine source for carbon in FoT mangrove sediments. Neither algal biomass nor grain size were found to be correlated with OC content in the Firth of Thames sediments. A gross estimate (integrated over the top 10 cm) of C and N stocks was 13.26 t C ha-1 and 1.47 t N ha-1, respectively, thus adding to the recognition of these forests as efficient carbon and nitrogen sinks.

This research contributes to the knowledge of C and N content, sources and burial patterns in subtropical mangrove sediments. Such information is required to underpin environmental management decisions, for example prior to undertaking restoration or removal projects.

year: 2020