Onerahi Primary School continues to set the standard in nurturing a thriving school community. In early 2023, the school extended on its dedication to hauora, infusing a focus on teacher wellbeing with the help of Sport Northland’s Active Workplaces programme.

At the helm of this initiative is Kaiako Meredith, who alongside the team, coordinated many in-house opportunities and support for the school's valuable staff.

Responding to the voices of their staff, Onerahi Primary School created a wellbeing board, where staff could identify their specific needs and desires. The result? A number of staff wanting to give back through Blue September (the Prostate Cancer Foundation's annual awareness and fundraising campaign), Movember (an annual event involving the growing of moustaches during the month of November to raise awareness of men's health issues), participating in the onsite yoga, and educational sessions on communication / financial wellbeing, and linking into Sport Northland’s other opportunities like the Run Walk Series and Green Prescription, among a myriad of other enriching experiences.

The financial wellbeing session, a highlight for the team, was based on questions that staff had asked and was delivered in an appropriate way in an informal setting with follow-up post the session available if required.

In addition to the already mentioned initiatives, the team enthusiastically embraced the Active Workplaces STeptember Challenge. Over 20 staff members elevated their daily step count, introducing a dash of innovation and joy into their routines. One of the teams, "Chasing Chocolate team," embarked on a memorable week of exploration, alongside their tamariki through bush tracks, as explained by one of the team “big week of steps for half of the Chasing Chocolate team as we took a bunch of kids to camp, found some beautiful bush tracks and learnt so much history on the way”.

As we head into the end of term four and the conclusion to another year, we look forward to seeing what Onerahi Primary School has on offer again in the wellbeing space for both tamariki and kaiako in 2024.

This is a great example of how a workplace can innovate and support their staff to move more for enhanced wellbeing.  For more information on Sport Northland’s Active Workplace initiative, contact Sharon Adams on sharona@sportnorth.co.nz