About us
John McCaffery and Judy McFall-McCaffery are co-joint directors of Waka Aotearoa Education Ltd. We work with schools and ECEs to develop Bilingual Immersion Language and Curriculum Programmes’ to support high levels of academic achievement in school and at home.
We have an extensive background in advising and designing programmes and workshops for education systems, leaders, schools, families, communities and churches supporting these education aspirations and programmes in Aotearoa New Zealand and in the Pacific. To date most of our work has been in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland where most of the current Bilingual Immersion Units in schools are situated.
John McCaffery
John McCaffery is a Honorary Senior Lecturer, academic, researcher and consultant within Bilingual/ Biliteracy Immersion Education, Te Puna Wananga (TPW) – School of Māori and Indigenous Studies, Faculty of Education, Epsom Campus, University of Auckland. He provides guest lecturing on Dual Medium biliteracy and support to TPW – (Tauwehe Tamati Hemi Dale, Tony Trinick).
He is a Director of Waka Aotearoa Education Limited a Pacific NZ Bilingual Immersion Education Biliteracy Consultancy.
John is a former head of department of the Reading Studies Department, Senior Lecturer School of Languages and Literacies. He was the writer, coordinator and lead lecturer for 20 years of the Bilingual Immersion Education papers in the DIP TESSOL at the Faculty of Education UoA. During this time he has assisted many schools and teachers to start Māori and Pacific Bilingual programmes, to develop programmes and to understand and apply evidence-based principles of pedagogy and practice.
He spends most of his time now in Bilingual schools, in programmes, research and on Advisory Committees. He has recently been the design consultant to the American Samoan Department of Education, the NZ MOE on a review of Pasifika biliteracy reading resources, to ERO Pasifika developing criteria and frameworks for Bilingual programme reviews.
John speaks two languages, Māori and English and is a learner of Samoan, Tongan, Cook Island Māori and Tahitian.
John has worked in Tonga on VSA, in Samoa and Kiribati on Foreign Affairs biliteracy education projects. He was contracted to the Cook Island Ministry of Education in 2006-2008 and in 2017-18 to Samoan Primary School in Apia, Samoa for professional development and research in Dual Medium Bilingual/ Biliteracy Education. John was a designer and consultant in the Taumualua Biliteracy American Samoa (Pago Pago) education project. He was a designer and writer for the ITE Huarahi Māori Biliteracy BEd at the FoEd UOA.
His research is on Simultaneous Biliteracy covering Samoan, other Pasifika, Māori, and French bilingual/biliteracy programmes.
John is a founding member of Te Reo Māori Society VUW/Aotearoa who started Māori Language Week, an exec member of the NZ Federation of Māori Students, and currently researcher for the Pasifika Ulimasao Bilingual Ed Association, the Mana Pacific.
With Judy he is a parent and grandparent of children of Samoan, Tongan, Cook Is, Fijian, Irish, & Italian heritages and involved in his Tongan famili, and Samoan aiga affairs and support.
Judy McFall-McCaffery
Umumaluolelagi Judy Taligalu McFall-McCaffery was born and raised in Samoa. An undergraduate of USP, Fiji and postgraduate of the University of Auckland, she speaks, reads and writes Samoan & Tongan and is a learner of te reo Māori.
Judy was the Pacific Academic Engagement Advisor at Te Tumu Herenga University of Auckland, where her work included promoting Pacific success in learning, teaching and research, raise visibility, and implement academic engagement activities.
She was awarded a LIANZA Fellowship in 2021 in recognition of her sustained and significant leadership, particularly in her tautua (service) as founder of the Pasifika Information Management Network (PIMN), to librarianship and the Pacific community.
She has researched, published and presented on policies on bilingualism and languages in the Pacific; raising Pacific tertiary student achievement using a Pacific Academic Information Literacy curriculum integration approach that builds on students’ language, culture and identity; and building Pasifika workforce capacity in the library and information sector.
She is the Chair of the Pasifika Working Group of the Auckland Languages Strategy, a joint Coordinator with John McCaffery of the Bilingual Leo Pacific Coalition, executive member of the Ulimasao Bilingual Immersion Education Assoc, advocate for Bilingual Immersion Education, Parish Steward of Wesley Roskill Methodist and a NZLPA lay preacher.