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Tuturu protective leaves

Try Tūturu

Find out how to begin your Tūturu journey with us.

Who we are

Led by the New Zealand Drug Foundation, Tūturu is supported by:

  • The Ministry of Education
  • Te Whatu Ora Community Health
  • Mental Health and Addictions and Health 
    Promotion (previously Te Hiringa Hauora)
  • NZ Police

We’ve expanded our partnerships across Aotearoa, fostering partnerships and positive change in the education and health sectors.

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Tūturu "has changed the focus from punitive to pastoral"

New Zealand Council for Educational Research

How to use the Tūturu approach

Start where it makes sense to you and your school community. We can tailor how we help you to fit what you need.

The common ways for people to work with us are:

  1. Selecting the resources you need. We can help you use and tailor any of these resources for your context. 
  2. Attending Tūturu learning sessions. We host regular learning sessions, using our wide network of health and education experts.
  3. Partnering with us for a more comprehensive plan. We help you create a tailored plan and work with you to implement it. You can also access an activity fund to help implement actions, and have access to our wide networks of health and education experts as we further develop Tūturu.

The rest of this page describes what partnering with us involves.

I want to partner, where do I start?

We will link you with a Tūturu provider in your area.

In your first meeting, they will:

  • Explain the Tūturu approach and how it works in practice. 
  • Talk you through Tūturu resources and how to best use them. 
  • Work with you to create a plan that works for your school.

Interested in partnering with us?

Contact us to get started.

The Tūturu approach

The Tūturu approach brings health and education expertise together so we create a tailored plan that fits your school.

Change takes time and schools are busy places. These steps and resources help to manage the process.

We will help you form your team, understand your starting place, and tailor a plan that suits your school.

We will have a long-term partnership with your school - helping you take action and review progress. This means that you can choose different areas to focus action as needed.

How we will help you create your own tailored plan

Begin by establishing a Tūturu leadership group (your “Tūturu team”) at your school. Ideally, this will be made up of between eight to ten staff. Ensure you include a cross-section of staff responsible for different parts of your school’s curriculum, people with pastoral support responsibilities, and an effective coordinator.

The team should be led by a staff member who has decision-making power at your school.

Partnering with a Tūturu provider will help your community to understand what you are working on and means their expertise can inform your approach. It will also help the provider to understand your school – helping them be better prepared to meet students’ needs.

Your Tūturu Team’s first task is to build an understanding of your school’s starting point. We use the school-wide reflection tool to guide conversation. It can be completed in different ways (e.g., in small groups or through a survey and discussion with all staff). Discussion is the most valuable part, and often different viewpoints or practices emerge.

You can use multiple sources of information – such as the Wellbeing@School survey or focus groups with students and their families – to build a more accurate picture. Getting data could be one of the actions that you put into your plan.

Capture all the ideas and potential actions that emerge during your discussions.

With your starting point established, you can now begin priortising next steps and exploring what is feasible over the next year. You can use this tailored plan template.

Align your priorities with other strategic plans, like the school charter. This will connect your work with a bigger vision and build buy-in from the rest of your school community – helping you progress smoothly.

What partnering can look like

Here is a video created by student leaders at Huntly College in 2020 to describe how they experienced the work we did with their school. These student leaders presented it at the 2020 Tūturu Summit, held at Parliament.