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Countdown to conference
It’s being held at the Viaduct Events Centre in Auckland on Thursday and Friday, 18-19 August.
We expect to release the programme and open registrations in the coming weeks.
In the meantime, here are some key updates on New Zealand’s international education event of the year:
Help us celebrate 25th anniversary
2016 marks the 25th year of the New Zealand International Education Conference being held. We’d love you to help us celebrate 25 years of international education networking, sharing and capability development. If you’ve been around in the industry for “a while”, we’d love to hear from you.
We want to showcase how our industry has grown and changed over the past 25 years. So if you have some interesting memories, stories, records or recollections, please drop us a line. It would be great to feature your memories as part of our 25th celebrations.

BPO Intelligence comes to the party again

A big thanks to our Platinum Sponsor, BPO Intelligence, who are sponsoring NZIEC for the third consecutive year. We’re grateful for their support of NZIEC – as well as the support they provide to international education providers across the country.
BPO Intelligence offers a wide range of services for international education providers. Check out what they offer at www.bpointelligence.com and be sure to check out their booth at conference.

Official media partner
We’re excited to announce that we’ve partnered with The PIE (Professionals in International Education) as our official media partner for NZIEC 2016. The PIE team will be exhibiting at and reporting from the conference. If you haven’t already, you can sign up for The PIE News here.
Gold and silver sponsors
We’re pleased to announce that Hotcourses and QS World University Rankings will be joining us at NZIEC 2016 as Gold Sponsors.
Southern Cross Travel Insurance will feature at NZIEC as a Silver Sponsor.
Find out more about our sponsors at the conference website and be sure to check out their booths at the conference exhibition hall.

Exhibitors
We have an array of exhibitors confirmed for NZIEC 2016:
- ASB Bank
- BPO Intelligence
- Education New Zealand
- Hotcourses
- ICEF
- MBIE Immigration New Zealand
- New Zealand Police
- New Zealand Qualifications Authority
- PTE Academic
- QS World University Rankings
- Schools International Education Business Association (SIEBA)
- The PIE.
Stay tuned
We’ll be releasing the programme and opening registrations for NZIEC in the coming weeks at www.nziec.co.nz. You can also stay tuned via E-News and LinkedIn.
Getting social with Loay Al Shareef
Loay profiles English-language destinations via Snapchat (30-50k views per video), Twitter (80k+ followers) and his YouTube channel Fallimha (600k subscribers).
He came here under ENZ’s Visiting Media Familiarisation Programme, and as part of a broader #yoursummerinNZ English-language campaign in Saudi Arabia.
Heidi Stedman, Communications Lead hosted the visit in her penultimate week at ENZ, with Sahinde Pala, Regional Programme Manager, taking up the reins for the Auckland leg.
Together with Loay and videographer Glen, they visited Auckland, Wellington and Queenstown to meet with Saudi students, sample local food and activities, and profile education options.
Loay's visit, with the #yoursummerinNZ campaign, successfully delivered. Together they generated an extra 13,000 Twitter followers for @nzeducationsa during the three-week campaign, prompted 8,600 tweets, and received more than 3,100 entries in a competition to study English in New Zealand.
English-language providers also reported enrolments coming directly from ENZ’s Twitter account during the campaign.
I met Loay for dinner with six Saudi students on his last night in Auckland,” said Peter Bull, ENZ General Manager - International.
“He talked endlessly about New Zealand, and how impressed he was with the education he'd seen.
“He connected really well with the students, and they reinforced for him how good their own New Zealand experience was.
“Ours was a story he clearly enjoyed telling.”
Above: Loay with Peter Bull
Saying it with socks
Back in May, we reported that Lincoln University had committed to providing international students with a parcel of hand-knitted woolly socks, pineapple lumps and a personal letter ahead of their arrival.
These photos show that those socks have been a big hit!
Lincoln’s International and Student Engagement Director Dee Coleman says that the university receives international students from over 60 countries each year, with some coming unprepared for a New Zealand winter down South. To help them stay warm, Lincoln started the project to provide students with handmade woolly socks.
“When we looked at our source countries, we realised that a lot of our students hail from warm climates and although intrigued by a Kiwi winter, can often come unprepared.”
“Our aim is to keep them warm with some good, old-fashioned Kiwi hospitality, and what better way than with some homespun and hand-knitted South Island woolly socks.”
The socks are hand-knitted by a group of Darfield spinning and knitting enthusiasts, headed up by neighbours Pip Anderson and Ruth Buttle. They have committed to producing up to 40 pairs of hand-knitted socks a year for the university, destined for locations all around the world.
Retired from a life of farming in the district, Ruth still spins her own wool despite no longer having a dedicated flock of black sheep for the purpose. She buys wool, cards it and spins it into double ply wool. It takes a minimum of two hours to spin one ball of wool.
Pip says they are aiming to keep the colours neutral, with splashes of colour so that they look natural and hand made.
Ruth says spinning and knitting are still popular pastimes for rural New Zealand women and that projects like this are an excellent opportunity to get together.
A first for Southland Girls’ High
The national news site Stuff ran a charming story last week about a young Thai student, Kamolsiri (Kate) Damrongmanee, who is the first international prefect to be voted in in the 137-year history of Invercargill’s Southland Girls’ High School.
The story covers her life as a busy Year 13 student and prefect. Kate also talks about her love of the southern city’s cold weather and the community’s warm support.
Agent Activity Fund in Colombia takes off
The event was organised by Colombian agency Go Study, Work and Travel and supported by ENZ’s Colombia team, via their Agent Activity Fund. In this inaugural round of the Fund, Colombian agencies were invited to “let their imaginations fly” in proposing ways to promote New Zealand and increase Colombian student numbers to New Zealand.
Five agencies were awarded NZ$2,000 each, with Go Study, Work and Travel's information session being the first cab off the rank.
As an incentive, all participants at the information session went into the draw to receive two 12-week, English-language scholarships donated by EDENZ and New Zealand Language Centres.
The lucky scholarship winners were announced at the event.
A guest speaker at the session was Colombian blogger Maggi Mora who studied English in New Zealand last summer via an English New Zealand International Education Growth Fund project, and raved about her experiences here.
“This was a clear example of the benefits of different agencies working together,” says Lisa Futschek, ENZ Regional Director Americas and Europe.
“An offshore agent, NZ institutions, a former student and ENZ all working together to promote New Zealand is a powerful thing.”
Javiera Visedo, ENZ Market Development Manager in Colombia, says upcoming projects funded by the Agent Activity Fund will focus on promotional activities using social media.
“It was great to see so many agents interested in partnering with us and submitting projects for consideration.
We would like to increase the fund next year because running it for the first time in 2016 has resulted in great exposure for New Zealand.”

Note: If you’re interested in promoting your region to Colombian agents, then check out the ‘Networking starts at home’ story for an opportunity to meet with Colombian (and other) agents in Wellington on Friday 27 May.
Scholarship certificate ceremony
The morning tea event was hosted by Will Tregidga, the University of Otago’s Regional Marketing Manager – North America and Europe, and six of the seven US students attended.
There were three scholarships awarded, including US Generation Study Aboard-New Zealand Universities Excellence awards (worth NZ$500 each); Education New Zealand Study Abroad Travel Awards (worth NZ$2000 each); and the University of Otago’s Go Overseas Scholarships (worth $2000 each).
Scholarships open for students from Europe
A new scholarship programme designed to increase awareness of New Zealand as a study destination to students in Europe is open.
The “Dream NEW” scholarships target confident, adventurous European university students who are competent enough in English to undertake study at a New Zealand university. The scholarships will appeal to students who like to travel and experience different cultures, while improving their English language skills.
Jointly funded by Education New Zealand and Universities New Zealand, “Dream NEW” offers eight scholarship places – one at each New Zealand university.
The scholarships are valued at up to NZD$ 12,500 (approx. 7,500 €) and will cover tuition fees for eight students undertaking a Study Abroad programme in Semester One, in February and March 2017.
More information on the scholarships can be found on the Study in New Zealand site here.
Information and application details are available in English, French, Italian, Spanish and German.
Learn more about global edtech opportunities
Are you interested in making connections or forming partnerships with education publishers, game developers, ICT companies and educationalists?
Do you want to showcase your edtech tool and learn about how and why teachers and their students are using technology in the classroom?
If the answer is yes, then register now for the Education Technology Summit on 5-6 July at Massey University’s innovation hub in Albany, Auckland.
For those of you from edtech companies outside of Auckland we have 20 heavily discounted tickets to give away. The money you save will get you to Auckland!
Just tell us how much you think educational exports ($ million) contribute to GDP by 31 May. The closest answers will get you a ticket to the two day summit for just $100 – a prize valued at $295. Send your answer to adele.bryant@enz.govt.nz.
Following feedback from previous annual Edtech for Export (et4e) conferences, this year ENZ is supporting the New Zealand Technology Industry Association in bringing educators and edtech businesses together at the same event.
This year’s more collaborative approach – bringing creators and users together – will provide a platform for the growth and development of sustainable and relevant edtech tools for the domestic and export markets.
The Education Technology Summit programme offers separate Edtech for Export and Tech and Pedagogy streams, and plenty of opportunity for interaction between the two.
The programme includes export capability building sessions as well as the chance to hear from local and international speakers on global edtech trends and tips for exporting.
Presenters include:
- Betsy Corcoran, CEO of EdSurge, an award-winning US news and information source on edtech, will speak on “Mind sets and the future of educational technology”.
- Dan Milward of Gamefroot, a provider of online game creation software that teaches programming code in a fun and interactive way
- Graeme Cosslett, CEO of the New Zealand Council for Educational Research (NZCER)
And, if you’re still wondering whether or not to make the Summit a ‘must attend’ event in your calendar, here’s a success story that had its beginnings in the et4e conference in 2013:
Gamefroot and NZCER are a great example of the power of deep collaboration between educational researchers and game makers. Gamefroot’s Dan Milward and Rachel Bolstad of NZCER worked in the same Wellington building but did not realise they shared a common interest in educational games until they met at et4e 2013. Since then, they have worked together to develop and launch a unique online game for teachers and policy makers called Curriculum for the Future: the Digital Game.
If you have any queries about the Education Technology Summit, contact Business Development Manager, Adele Bryant at adele.bryant@enz.govt.nz.
Otherwise, see you in Auckland in July!
Thinking regionally, acting globally, at ANZA
Education New Zealand (ENZ) extended its presence this year by creating a New Zealand pavilion, featuring 11 regional international education organisations hosted by regional representatives. The Immigration New Zealand team, lead by Celia Coombes, joined the pavilion along with the ENZ team.
In addition to the pavilion, ENZ organised additional wrap-around events to both create a spirit of collaboration amongst the regional representatives, and maximise the networking with agents, New Zealand education providers and the team from ICEF.
ENZ’s Regional Project Managers, Jo Keane and Sarah Gauthier, believe the regional approach boosted the profile of New Zealand education as a whole, with Sarah commenting, “Each New Zealand region has its own distinctive characteristics and it’s important to raise awareness of these to agents so they can, in turn, promote them to international students.
“ANZA was a great forum to showcase the diversity of our study options and the regional learning, living and working opportunities, and share the New Zealand Story with our agent audience” said Greg Scott, Programme Manager for the Regional Partnership Programme.
This year’s innovative approach to ANZA was regarded as a great success by the regional representatives, with Learning Hawke’s Bay’s Business Development Manager, Stephanie Kennard, commenting, “The Pavilion made a huge impact and was a talking point amongst many of the agents. The stand, the ENZ presentation on the Wednesday afternoon and the networking event on Friday night were all brilliant!”
Susanna Leisten, an ANZA attendee from Thames High School, says, “I felt so proud to be a Kiwi and am very grateful and appreciative of all your efforts and really enjoyed the ENZ Friday evening networking event. I have made some very useful contacts and am positive that the event you hosted made a big difference.”
“We think that these types of collaborative platforms are essential – to strengthen the New Zealand education story with regional input and opportunities. We hope to do more of this in the future,” said Greg Scott.
ENZ is now considering ways to incorporate regional international education organisations into other events and activities, demonstrating so effectively the learning, living and working opportunities for international students across all of New Zealand.
US students experience tikanga Māori on the high seas
Staff and students from the University of Auckland and the Auckland University of Technology enjoyed a day out with local Māori tourism operators Waka Quest Tours and Te Haerenga, which included sailing on the waka Haunui to Motutapu Island where they tasted a delicious hāngī and did some exploring.
ATEED’s International Product Development Manager, Keri Edmonds, says, “This sort of activity is designed to enhance the international student experience. A key focus for our team is to raise the awareness of our cultural offering to international students, and provide greater opportunity for them to connect with Auckland’s people and landscapes.”
“While it’s still early days for this pilot project, it was great to have the opportunity to test out some ideas, which was made possible by funding support from Education New Zealand’s Regional Partnership Programme.”
ATEED’s Māori Tourism Development Manager, Koro Carmen joined Keri on the day and commented, “It was an incredible day of engaging with locals, taking part in tikanga Māori activities and exploring some of Auckland’s iconic landscapes. This is a great example of Māori operators connecting and collaborating with our colleagues to enhance the visitor experience. We were even lucky enough to see several of the endangered takahē wandering around the island!”