Teacher recognised for going the extra mile for students urges Aotearoa to work 'as a village, look out for one another'

November 28, 2018

Jackie Passi’s a teacher and dean at Waitakere College.

An Auckland high school teacher, dean and mentor who has been awarded for her commitment in and out of the classroom says New Zealand needs to do a lot of work to bring back the spirit of "working as a village".

Jackie Passi of Waitakere College is the winner of this week's ASB Good as Gold segment on TVNZ1's Seven Sharp.

The bank has awarded Ms Parsi $10,000 to realise her dream of taking her Dad on a trip to Vatican City.

Jade Barker, who nominated Ms Passi for the award, said Ms Passi "is like the glue that holds us all together" at the school.

"She gets up very early, she comes into school, helps with the breakfast club."

Waitakere College Principal Mark Shanahan said Ms Passi "epitomises everything you talk about making a difference for kids". 

She runs a programme called Mates which works with Auckland University and helps run the school's Samoan group, her colleagues said.

Ms Passi mentored Orla Angi under the Pillars programme that supports children with parents in prison.

"My Dad was in prison three years ago. And I bottled up a lot of stuff. And I couldn't talk to my own mother. So she was there, a person I could talk to," Orla said of Ms Passi.

Mr Shanahan said: "Those kids are still given that chance of good mentoring all the way through while their parents may be in jail or in the system."

"We can't believe what she does. Beside being a head of house here and a dean, looking after year thirteens, checking all the academic progress, she just goes and adds all this extra value to kids' days and kids' lives and to the families."

Bring back that good old Kiwi, that working as a community, working as a village, looking out for one another

—  Jackie Passi | Waitakere College teacher

Students, staff and family made up what was probably the biggest turnout for a Good as Gold presentation as reporter Sam Wallace surprised Ms Passi mid-class with news of her win.

"Holy Moly!" she declared, wiping tears when told of the award, before hugging her parents and colleagues.

"New Zealand needs to do a lot of work, bring back that good old Kiwi, that working as a community, working as a village, looking out for one another. I think we've lost a lot of that," Ms Passi told Wallace in an interview later. 

"You know, we do this job because we know we can make a difference. We know that the most important people are our students. So if nobody else is going to do it then who's going to do it? So we step up to do that," she said.

"We don't get paid much but hey, you know, we do it because that's what we're passionate about.

"This is just a dream come true. And one of the things I've always wanted to do too was to go to Europe and be able to go with my family and share that and see all that. Never been!"

Before the holiday though, there's still work to do including running the homework club after school, and colleagues say this woman Seven Sharp dubbed an "awesome human" is often not home til eight o'clock at night.

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