Editorial: Revisioning education in Oceania: Walking backward into the future, together

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Re-framing Pacific regional service delivery: Opportunity spaces for together and apart

Regionalism is a common development strategy in the Pacific region. Through it, numerous services are delivered to countries, communities and organisations. While some see regionalism as an effective and efficient strategy for the Pacific region, others point to its dismal performance.  Using the experience of the Rethinking Pacific Education Initiative for and by Pacific Peoples (RPEIPP) as a regional strategy, this paper explores regional service delivery and offers a plausible way of re- framing service and delivery for conceptualizing Pacific regional strategies

The Conference as Feast

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Melanesian tok stori in leadership development: Ontological and relational implications for donor-funded programmes in the Western Pacific

Donor-funded programmes in areas such as leadership development take place in every continent. In the Western Pacific, Melanesia has been host to such programmes based on non-Melanesian thought and practice over the years. However, a review of donor-funded leadership programmes in the region reveals a history of concern regarding effectiveness but no significant change in programme orientation. This article provides a counter-story of a donor-funded leadership programme which utilizes a readily available cultural model of thought and practice of Indigenous origin: tok stori. Tok stori is a form of discursive group communication which is an everyday occurrence in Melanesia. The experiences of leadership mentors operating in a tok stori-centred leadership development programme located in the Solomon Islands provide an opportunity to explore and evaluate what cultural wisdom can contribute as the core of a leadership development programme. The benefits are many: leaders benefit when complex contextual matters can be introduced into leadership development by the openness of tok stori; depth of engagement is supported by the development of mentor-leader relationality as an integral part of the tok stori process; and mentors gain increased expertise in using a cultural form with which they are already familiar in new pedagogical contexts. Ultimately, this is a story of the value of honouring important aspects of culture for those who inhabit the ontology which gives them significance. Re-negotiating the way the cultures of donors and recipients are regarded by programme developers is an important factor in the centring of Indigenous thinking and practices such as tok stori in leadership and other person-centred programmes. The lesson of this article is that there are gains available to all where this occurs

Waka hem no finis yet: Solomon Islands research futures

Research provides discovery in the present, and a legacy for the future. The knowledge gained is in pursuit of a more complete understanding of the world, natural and social. However, research is not a static entity. Much can be learned by examining past outputs of researchers. Never a neutral activity, research is paradigmatically embedded, always with a purpose in mind. Formal research of one kind or another has long been conducted in the Solomon Islands archipelago; it has provided a rich example of Pacific research as unfinished work, waka hem no finis yet, which resonates with the bodies of research from other Pacific contexts. In this article, we mine the research past of Solomon Islands to examine the directions taken over time by researchers. We then then pay attention to recent research, honouring the work of emerging researchers and the Solomon Islandcentric steerage that some are currently offering. Finally, we speculate on future directions that have the potential to further contextualise research, supporting it to reflect local thinking and lifeways, and offering wisdom to the wider Pacific and beyond. We hope that this reflexive journey will encourage Pacific researchers, including those serving Solomon Islands, to fully be themselves in their own spaces. In doing so, may they bring honour to all those who contribute to Pacific research that seeks the common good and wisdom to those that seek it

Contextualising leadership: looking for leadership in the everyday

Leadership is a significant issue in the development context because much work takes place with or through leaders. Often, development policy aims to build the capacity of existing leaders in government, civil society and so on, understanding leadership as a lever to support positive change. However, leadership is contextual: leaders practice leadership in many contexts across every society. Leadership interventions that do not make everyday sense to people lack deep contextualisation. To move forward, effective strategies for learning about leadership in context are required. Leadership may be a shared practice in which a key obligation involves passing valued information intergenerationally. Leadership can be a matter of shared identity, navigation of direction and relationship management. Leadership in some contexts aims at distribution and cohesion. This paper asks key questions of leadership in context; what it is, what kinds of contextual evidence are appropriate for leadership claims, and where to look for evidence of leadership. These questions are important in reaching complex development problems, and in finding ways of addressing them that are practical, appropriate and sustainable

Appreciating Pacific understandings of school leadership

This report is a summary of the DLP webinar ‘Appreciating Pacific understandings of school leadership’ that took place on 28 October 2021. There were four key takeaways from the discussion. In the Pacific Islands, getting to grips with the ‘context behind the context’ is paramount. This means understanding the domain of indigenous cultures and kastom, the domain of religion, and the institutional domain. Not only do these domains need to be understood, but the relationship between them – both in terms of commonalties and differences – needs to be properly appreciated. This requires deep listening to communities and building on local expertise. Preliminary research findings provide helpful guidance for external actors looking to implement policy or developmental programmes – including how they might acknowledge the importance of flux and the changing demands on leaders. An approach that privileges indigenous concepts to educational development and leadership will be more likely to succeed