Kua hinga te tōtara i te wao nui a Tāne. Haere, e te rangatira, haere atu rā. A tōtara has fallen in the great forest of Tāne. Go, esteemed one, farewell.
We received the very sad news on Tuesday that Liz Hannah, our long-serving Psychology and Criminal Minds teacher, passed away over the weekend. Liz had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of leukaemia only three or four weeks earlier, and the speed at which her illness progressed has been a shock to all of us.
Liz arrived in Aotearoa from Yorkshire in 2006, and started teaching senior Psychology online in February 2007. She was always quick to point out that Yorkshire is, thankfully, not Coronation Street country. In the UK she had taught Psychology and Religious Studies. Here in New Zealand she added Social Studies, English, History and Geography to her teaching, while taking on senior leadership roles as deputy principal at Murchison Area School and later as principal at Waiau Area School.
Her online teaching career runs the full arc of collaborative online learning in Aotearoa. She started with WestNet in 2007 from Murchison, moved to OtagoNet in 2012 while at Waiau, and then continued with NetNZ from its formation in 2015. For at least the last six years she taught from the UK, an arrangement that suited her well. She was, by her own description, a night owl, and the time difference let her teach NZ mornings without ever needing an early start.
Liz developed and delivered our Criminal Minds course, contextualising senior Psychology through forensic and legal studies. It became one of the most popular courses we offer, particularly for students drawn to true crime, and it was very much hers in shape and content.
Kathy, eDean at Buller High School, remembers Liz always making the effort to call in when she was through Westport, and often making a special trip just to see her Buller High students in person. Sonya, eDean at Southland Girls’, said much the same. Their students loved Liz’s classes, and they loved Liz.
In her own words about teaching with NetNZ:
“I enjoy the challenge it provides me. It allows me to inspire students to explore human behaviour and the complexities of the human mind. It challenges me to find new and innovative ways of imparting information, encouraging independent research, and learning from students. It also challenges me to stay up late enough at night to teach in the morning in NZ.”
Our thoughts are with Liz’s family, with her colleagues at NetNZ, and with the many students who learned with her over almost two decades.
