Rate My Professor Donna Waitere

Donna Waitere is the Māori Engagement Adviser at the University of Otago Library (Te Pātaka Mātauraka o Te Whare Wānanga o Otāgo), based in the Information Services Building at 65 Albany Street, Dunedin. She holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Otago. In her role within the Customer Experience section, Waitere supports Māori tauira by connecting with their communities to ensure they feel welcome and can effectively utilize library services, resources, and spaces. She works collaboratively with Pacific Engagement Adviser Sela Pole-Fehoko to assist both Māori and Pacific students. Waitere leads efforts to indigenise library environments and programs, such as integrating the kaupapa of whare learning spaces into the Māori 101 library workshop and applying the Pacific kakala model to enhance information literacy searching. She is a key contact in the Māori, Pacific, and Indigenous Studies LibGuide and numerous others across disciplines including English, Law, Sociology, Management, Chemistry, Genetics, Planning Studies, Languages and Cultures, Human Geography, Data and Information Science, Gender Studies, Theology, Entrepreneurship, and more, demonstrating her broad support for Māori student success university-wide.

Innovative engagement initiatives spearheaded by Waitere include an advice tree placed in the Central Library, inspired by a successful Matariki tree featuring staff messages. This project invited returning tauira to write advice for first-year students on paper leaves, yielding responses that Waitere described as beautiful and thoughtful. She has been instrumental in fostering student-library connections through such creative programs. Additionally, during the 2022 COVID-19 lockdowns, Waitere volunteered among library staff to deliver meals to college residents, helping to ease the burden on frontline teams. Her contributions promote an inclusive, culturally responsive library experience aligned with the University of Otago's values.