Relational Excellence: High Expectations for Pasifika Learners

Relational Excellence: High Expectations for Pasifika Learners

Join the Australian Pasifika Educators Network (APEN) for the launch of our Professional Learning Series with an engaging online workshop designed for educators, academics, professional staff and education leaders committed to strengthening outcomes for Pasifika learners.

Facilitated by Cassandra Walton, an Australian I-Kiribati educator, Founder of Real Stuff Matters (RSM Pacific) and Education Consultant with the World Bank, this interactive session explores how educators can move beyond deficit narratives and cultivate culturally responsive, strengths-based and high-expectation practice across schools and higher education.

Grounded in evidence-informed practice and Pacific perspectives, this workshop will challenge participants to reflect critically on their own assumptions while developing practical strategies that foster belonging, relational trust and academic excellence.

What you will explore

• Recognising and interrupting deficit thinking in educational contexts.

• Strengthening culturally responsive and strengths-based teaching practice.

• Understanding how belonging, trust and relationships influence learner success.

• Practical strategies that can be applied immediately in classrooms, universities and student support settings.

Who should attend?

This workshop is suitable for:

• Teachers (Primary and Secondary)

• University academics

• Professional staff

• Educational leaders

• Student engagement, equity and support practitioners

• Anyone working alongside Pasifika learners and communities

Meet your facilitator

Cassandra Walton is an Australian I-Kiribati education practitioner with more than 15 years' experience across community, school and education system settings in Australia and the Pacific. As Founder of Real Stuff Matters (RSM Pacific) and an Education Consultant with the World Bank, she has worked alongside governments, ministries of education and development partners to strengthen teaching quality and educational outcomes through culturally responsive and locally led approaches.

Drawing on both professional expertise and lived experience, Cassandra invites educators to examine where deficit thinking quietly shapes educational practice and to leave with practical, evidence-informed strategies that can be implemented immediately.

High expectations and cultural integrity are not in tension - they are inseparable. This is relational excellence in practice.