Sue and her English language students in Morocoo

Sue Matthews has lived, worked and travelled in some of the world’s most exotic spots… but she’s always drawn back to Gisborne.

The Brit turned Kiwi has a long association with EIT Tairāwhiti, having worked there for nearly 13 years before heading south to complete her degree in culinary arts and design at Otago University.

She has spent the past year travelling, including time in Morocco teaching english and helping set up a hospitality school for refugees and immigrants for people from the sub-Sahara nations.

Now she is just as excited to be the new coordinator for Adult Community Education.

“It’s all about taking quality education to our diverse region,” she says. “We want to make it available for all.” Part of that includes new ACE Get Started programmes. “The Get Started courses are short taster courses to engage prospective students into learning, or maybe just giving them the confidence to study.”

The courses, for anyone who is 16 and over and not in full time study, are free and include subjects like computing, tourism, personal presentation and beauty. Some are run over the weekend to give students more freedom to fit it into their lives.

“The beauty of these taster programmes is that they don’t leave the student with a debt,” says Ms Matthews.

The courses are run throughout the East Coast, Tairāwhiti and right down to Central Hawke’s Bay. “We are always looking to find out what people in these regional areas want so we can try to accommodate their learning wish-lists.

These are stepping stones and it’s an exciting way to engage in learning.”