Blair Dravitski

I'm a parent as well.

And I have the same, um, when I take the principal hat off and become a parent.

Absolutely.

The amount of times I've, I've tried to send my wife to conferences because, um, they do, you walk in and they know your role and responsibility, but it's, it's, um, being a, being a parent is something that I'm very proud of as well.

And in these situations, um,

Busy is a funny word.

It's not one that I particularly like because it is something that as a job and as a profession, we do want those connections and relationships with families.

And it's one of those ones that I've learned over the years, especially working in South Auckland, which is just such a wonderful space to learn about community and relationship.

And I'd highly recommend that.

anyone looking at teaching as a place to go, Southall, and what a great space to be in, for myself anyway, who just fast-tracked my career.

Learning from Polynesian and Māori communities just taught me that real connection to Māori

family and and community was was about um and i know some schools have um i guess examples where you're not allowed to email people after five o'clock um but from our school point of view our staff aren't expected to engage with that but i know um just an example when i worked in south auckland going to denny's after a netball game at 9pm at night and seeing a family having dinner and my own judgmental side went oh geez that's late for our kids to be out on a school night

But actually, mum and dad had worked all day, and then dad had a night job as well.

So the one hour they had between the two things was time for family to come together.

And so those types of stories, to me, actually, that might also be the only hour they have to send an email.

So if that's the case, then I process it differently, and I don't have any expectation of my staff to respond at that time of night, nor do I want them to, because sometimes that's the discussion.

But we don't have the clear-cut message about 5 p.m.

cut-off, which I know some countries have completely changed, and it's almost become illegal.

No, that was fantastic.

I hope that was okay.