Rate My Professor Michaella Simpson

Michaella Simpson serves as a Library Assistant at the University of Otago's Wellington campus, supporting students in the Division of Health Sciences. She was featured in a university news article published on September 12, 2024, titled 'Murals bring new student study spaces to life.' The article highlights her involvement in a collaborative project to install large photographic wall murals in new, windowless student study spaces located in the Wellington Hospital’s Ward Support Block. These murals depict natural scenes of Porirua Harbour (the largest at 7m x 2.6m), Whitireia maunga, and Te Iti Kahurangi, the campus’s kākahu cloak, photographed by campus photographer Luke Pilkinton-Ching. The spaces are designed for undergraduate medical, radiation therapy, and physiotherapy students, providing areas for collaborative work, quiet study, PCs, and a meditation room.

The project incorporates cultural significance, including a whakataukī 'Whāia te iti kahurangi' emphasizing perseverance, wisdom, and resilience, as explained by Māori Strategic Framework Project Manager Toa Waaka. Simpson appears in a photo with medical students Sara Aruquipa Southerwood and Sandra Dondi, and Resource Access and Interloans Librarian Jung Cho. Overseen by Health Sciences Librarian Kareen Carter, the initiative was supported by staff such as Associate Dean Māori Paula MacLachlan, Associate Professor Bridget Robson, and Deputy Health Sciences Librarian Donna Tietjens, and funded by the Medical Assurance Society. The spaces are temporary for five years during the relocation of the Medical and Health Sciences Library.