Konini School

Barry Hambleton

Principal, Konini School

Barry grew up in Dunedin and attended Mornington School and Otago Boys High before completing his teacher training at Dunedin Teachers College. Why teaching? “I think it was my father. My grandfather was a cabinet maker and I was keen on woodwork, however my father suggested that teaching would give me a job for life. And it has been, everyday is different, I love children and I enjoy helping people which means accepting interruptions. (I did make our first china cabinet though.)” At the interview that followed teacher qualification Barry was offered Strath Taieri High School in Middlemarch (Central Otago) and when he accepted it the entire 8 person panel shook his hand! From there it was back to Dunedin to Green Island School for three years during which he met Nola who was at Melville Park Primary in Mosgiel. They married and Barry and Nola both taught at Melville Park for a period. Children came along and Barry took a sole charge role at Edievale Primary in West Otago for five years. Then on to Mandeville School near Gore, a two-teacher school for 3 years before an intriguing ad in the Otago Daily Times led to the young family moving to Nauru for two years! While Barry was to teach in the intermediate school Nola was to become junior school principal however the incumbent was still there. So Nola was commissioned to establish a Teachers College which she did, which Barry also lectured in. Returning to New Zealand Barry and Nola taught at a two teacher school at Kaipaki, near Mystery Creek and then the family returned to Dunedin where Barry was deputy principal at Portobello School, Dunedin North Intermediate, and then principal at Mosgiel West Primary and then Dunedin North Primary. By this time Nola was president of the NZ Primary Principals Association and they decided to move north. Seven years ago she was appointed principal of Manurewa South School and Barry became principal of Konini Primary School in Glen Eden. These days Barry is on the executive of the NZ Principals Association and he and Nola are closely involved with the International Confederation of Principals (she was the first woman and first Primary Principal in the world to be their president)and they have been part of the organising team for that entity’s 1600 person conference at the Aotea Centre. Konini School is a growing community school that values building incentives to develop superior maths and spelling skills. They believe in competition and award gold, silver and bronze medals every five weeks, they have a pupil-of-the-day everyday for the “Movers and Shakers”, and at the end of the year two in each class win school medals.