Planning Tokelau Language Week without the community in the room
Next term is Tokelau Language Week at a co-educational school of 900 students. Mr Bell, who teaches social sciences and is not Tokelauan, has planned the programme: a whole-school assembly; an 'inati relay' in which teams race to divide 40 cardboard fish according to set rules; a 'traditional dress' parade where students wear borrowed garments; a lunch stall; and a display of tapa. Five of the school's 22 Tokelauan students are asked to lead. Two families email the principal saying that inati is a real system for distributing a catch, with rules and people responsible for it, not a race, and that they are uncomfortable about students wearing garments borrowed for a parade. The principal wants something 'visible' for the whole school. The budget is $150 and Mr Bell has three weeks. One student, Ioane, says he is happy to teach a short hiva item to his own class but does not want to perform at assembly.
1. Diagnose what has gone wrong with the plan and what is at stake if it runs unchanged.
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Three problems, in order of seriousness.
- Consultation came after the plan was finished. The families were shown a completed programme and asked to approve it, which makes them a veto body rather than the knowledge holders. The people who can say what is appropriate to share are the families and the Taupulega, and they were not in the room when it mattered.
- A practice has been turned into a game. Inati is a distribution system with rules, roles and obligations. Racing to divide cardboard fish removes exactly the part that matters - who receives, why, and who is responsible - and leaves a prop. The families' objection is not oversensitivity; it is that 900 students will be taught a false version of a real practice.
- Borrowed garments and 'costume'. Dress is not neutral. Lending and wearing garments carries obligations, and framing them as costume turns living culture into dress-up, with children carrying the consequences.
The tapa display may be fine, but only if someone from the community can speak to it. The stakes: if nothing changes, the week teaches the school an invented Tokelau and the five Tokelauan students spend the week correcting it.
2. Propose a revised programme that keeps the principal's 'visible' whole-school element within $150 and three weeks, and explain how the consultation should run.
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Keep the visibility; change who decides and what is claimed.
Consultation (week 1). Ask the five students and their families to a 40-minute meeting, with the school's Tokelauan community liaison or a family member issuing the invitation. Ask not 'is this okay?' but 'what would you like the school to know, and what should we not do?' Record the answers and follow them.
Assembly. Replace the parade with a short item led by students who want to do it. Ioane's hiva with his own class is exactly that. Introductions in gagana Tokelau with an English gloss so the whole school understands.
Inati. Either drop the relay, or rebuild it as a demonstration with someone explaining the rules and responsibilities - no competition, no prizes. If no one from the community wants to run it, drop it.
Food and tapa. Keep the lunch if families want to run it; donated food stretches the $150. Display tapa with an explanation sourced from the community, not written by Mr Bell.
Students lead. The five students choose their roles, and no one is asked to represent 'Tokelau' alone. Evaluation: ask the families afterwards whether the week got it right.
3. How should the school respond to Ioane's partial agreement?
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Take him at his word, and build the boundary into the plan.
He has agreed to teach a hiva to his own class. He has not agreed to perform at assembly. Consent is specific, not general: treating a partial yes as a full yes teaches students that their boundaries do not count, which is the opposite of what the week claims to teach about respect.
Practical consequences:
- Book the classroom session and do not list him as an assembly performer.
- If an assembly item is wanted, ask for volunteers rather than assuming Ioane will lead it.
- Tell him exactly what his 'yes' involves - time, audience, who else is present - so he can confirm or withdraw.
- If he later offers to perform, accept, but the invitation must come from him.
This is the intercultural test in miniature. Respect is demonstrated in how a small refusal is handled, not in the assembly banner, and other students are watching how the school treats him.