Bringing home new perspectives: Nursing student learns about Indigenous community health in New Zealand – UM Today News
March 17, 2025
Nursing student Jordan Braun was already at the end of his degree program when he departed for an international mobility experience to New Zealand, but it turned out to be the perfect cap to his undergraduate education. This program brought six Indigenous nursing students to Whitireia New Zealand, a school in the city of Porirua which offers a Bachelor of Nursing Māori program. This specialised program is built around a framework of Indigenous approaches to healthcare in New Zealand, and University of Manitoba students came to collaborate and learn about how other cultures integrate Indigenous perspectives into healthcare and what that could mean for nursing education back home. As Braun describes it, “the overarching idea is – let’s go over there, see what they’re doing, and then see what we can learn, share, and bring back home.”
The experience was part of the Pathway to Indigenous Nursing Education (PINE) program at the UM, collaborating with researcher Dr. Wanda Phillips-Beck and the International Centre (IC), which oversees all international mobility experiences for students. The IC was instrumental in arranging the program, particularly with regards to funding.
At Whitireia, Braun and his peers joined nursing classes, engaged in group discussions, and participated in activities where they could learn from Māori community members. One activity that stands out for Braun was going out on the water in wakas ¬– a type of Māori boat – where they received teachings about traditional ways of navigation and the environment around them. According to Braun, their hosts reciprocated their eagerness to learn:
Read More: https://news.umanitoba.ca/gso-funding-braun/
