Team Solutions staff members meet one last time
14 December 2018
Over 200 current and former Team Solutions staff members gathered at the Mount Eden Bowling Club on Monday to celebrate the organisation’s legacy on the New Zealand education sector before it shut its doors for good on 14 December.
Since its inception in 2001 Team Solutions has served as the Faculty of Education and Social Work’s provider of professional development services to schools. During that time over 400 advisers, facilitators and Reading Recovery Tutors have worked with schools across New Zealand, raising outcomes for hundreds of thousands of students and significantly affecting the New Zealand education system.
Team Solutions has been responsible for carrying out government contracts and working with individual schools to raise students’ academic outcomes across a wide variety of areas, including literacy, math, science and culturally responsive and relational pedagogy.
“It has been an honour and a privilege to lead this organisation for the last 13 years,” Team Solutions director Camilla Highfield says. “I have worked with outstanding leaders and teachers both within the organisation and in schools in our country. All of them are focussed on equity and the steps they themselves can take to ensure our young people have the competencies, knowledge and experience required to live fulfilling lives.”
In 2019, the Play.Sport and Reading Recovery teams will deliver services for Future Learning Solutions. Kohia Education Centre will continue to offer short courses, seminars, PRT and the Teacher Education Refresh programme.
“Being a member of a such a long-standing team with noble intentions and clear values who consistently and rigorously work toward this goal has been the high point of our careers.”
The reunion was a chance for staff members to come together and remember those they had worked with, and say their goodbyes to team members working across the country.
“I caught up with a number of people I haven’t seen for years so it was really good to be able to do that,” Science facilitator Mike Stone says. Mike has been with Team Solutions for nine years.
“There were a lot of people there and it was lovely to see so many. It has been quite hard saying goodbye but it didn’t feel like you were so alone when there were so many people there.”
In 2019, the Play.Sport and Reading Recovery teams will deliver services for Future Learning Solutions - a new business unit being established by UniServices. Kohia Education Centre will continue to offer short courses, seminars, PRT and the Teacher Education Refresh programme.