Cullinane students succeed in regional competitions

Macy Duxfield, left, and Mona Wareka with their speech prizes.

by NZ CATHOLIC staff
NEW PLYMOUTH — On June 26, students Macy Duxfield and Mona Wareka travelled with the
Cullinane College kapa haka squad, Te Ngakau O Te Awa, seniors and a few junior students,
to the Nga Manu Korero regional competition at Spotswood College, New Plymouth.

Macy Duxfield, left, and Mona Wareka with their speech prizes.


Macy took part in the Sir Turi Carroll Junior English section and placed second out of 10
speakers. Mona took part in the Korimako Senior English section and was first out of 10 speakers.
Macy said: “It was really fun, the audience was fixated on me, which brought out more compassion for my topic while I spoke.” She spoke on the topic, YOLO — You Only Live Once.
Mona said she was very nervous leading up to the time that she had to deliver her speech,
“Education is the most powerful tool — use it!”, but as soon as she got up on stage the speech just began flowing out of her mouth.
“I felt so powerful as I grasped the attention of my audience. It was a great atmosphere — even speakers being nervous still gave off good wairua to those around them.”
When she was announced as the winner, Mona started crying. “It felt so good to win, but better
yet, to have my kapa haka whanau with me. Without them, and my support back at school,
I wouldn’t have won that trophy.”
As a result of winning Mona will travel to Hawke’s Bay in late September to compete in the Nga Manu Korero Nationals competition.
Fourteen schools from the Wanganui-Taranaki region either competed or supported their
kaupapa at the competitions.

fb-share-icon
Posted in

NZ Catholic Staff

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *