AUT’s Pauline Winter takes on new role

AUT’s Pauline Winter takes on new role

AUT University wishes to congratulate Pauline Winter who has been appointed as the Chief Executive Officer at the Ministry for Pacific Island Affairs.

Pauline has been Director of AUT’s Office of Pasifika Advancement since 2007 and has worked tirelessly to support and encourage Pasifika success at university level. The Office of Pasifika Advancement provides strategic advice to the Vice Chancellor on advancement of Pasifika students, staff and communities in New Zealand and around the South Pacific.

During her directorship Pauline was a strong advocate for increasing the number of PhD credentialed Pasifika students. She established an inspiring goal of 100 Pasifika PhDs by 2020 – furthering our goal of supporting Pasifika peoples’ participation, aspirations and success in learning and research.

Pauline is also responsible for organisation of the Memorandum of Understanding AUT signed with the Cook Islands Government earlier this year. The MOU provides opportunities for Cook Islands students to study part-time and full-time through AUT, and comes to life this week with the arrival of a group of Cook Islands postgraduate students who will be staying at Nga Wai o Horotiu (AUT’s marae) as part of their induction.

An early supporter of AUT’s Māori and Pasifika Postgraduate Wānanga Series – an integrated set of Wānanga, writing retreats, an annual symposium and more recently a reading group – Pauline has been a regular feature of the Wānanga as part of her commitment to mentoring young Pasifika and Māori scholars.

Pauline was the Pacific Business Trust business woman of the year in 1997 and awarded a Queens Service Order (QSO) in 2008 acknowledging her work to business and the Pacific communities. She is the Director of her own company, INTERPACIFIC Ltd, and is currently also serving on a number of boards, trusts, councils, advisory groups, commissions and committees.

AUT’s Vice Chancellor, Derek McCormack, says that the AUT community has greatly benefited from Pauline’s commitment to Pasifika education and from everything she has done for AUT in her time here. We look forward to working with Pauline in her new role.

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