Dear Parents, Caregivers and Friends of St Mary’s School,
Yesterday was Waitangi Day, New Zealand’s National day. It is a day in which we acknowledge our history and the part that our past plays in our present and indeed our future.

Marcus Garvey wrote "A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots."

To know where you come from individually is a powerful way of ensuring a sense of belonging and self worth. But it is also important to know where we as a nation came from and how we were formed.

My father’s siblings and he were the first of our family to be born in New Zealand. His parents and siblings had left their home to ensure a better future for their families. But for many of them home remained in the country they had left.

My children see themselves as only New Zealanders, for them home is here.

That is good, but it is also important to know how home came to be.

History never changes, but how it is recorded and presented do. So it is important for us as ‘Kiwis" to keep learning about our past while we sail into the future.
Have a great week,

Mike Brosnahan