 I've got three questions for Bill and Robin. We'll go through fairly quickly because I want to leave time for questions at the end and a mystery exercise. So first question for both of you, Robin, I'm curious how you got into this work and how the way that you got into this work has affected the way that you do the work that you're doing at the moment with stories in action. Right, so I'm a little bit nervous, I have to say, and just forgot something there, so I'm just going to backtrack. So Kiora, Bula, Marlauelele, Tlófa, and I say that because I just wanted to acknowledge everybody's contribution and yesterday I was so excited about Sean and Sarah who sort of said to come from a Pacific Island kind of perspective. So I'm taking that on right now. So how I got into this was I was a teacher and I've been a teacher probably since I graduated and I kind of didn't know that I was really going to do that and I didn't really choose it. I just thought it was going to be a pathway and that I'd do something better later actually. And so I did, you know, I was a primary school trained teacher and then I went on and did a degree and then I went into tertiary and, you know, and I taught at all levels and then I sort of thought, well, you know, you kind of hemmed in and I kind of decided that and I had this wonderful job for some of the time actually going around schools and I really loved it, so I went into schools and I saw what the programs I were running and that was what gave me the inspiration and I thought why not do something different. So that was when I started. I was a phys-ed teacher, so I danced the Olympic Games and danced the Rugby World Cup, wasn't a scholar at school, you know, my husband claims that at university I got straight Cs and just got enough to get by. But the point was was that I really, yeah, what really did happen was that I sort of had this love for, I suppose, sport and, you know, games and Rugby World Cup and all of that and that went really well and then I just, suddenly, we went to a talk with Robert Swan about the Antarctica, both Bill and I went and he's the only guy that have walked both poles and he, I just stopped dead in my tracks. I just thought, you know, we've got to do something with the environment. So that was it. Move to tears about that. That truth that came out yesterday and so I decided, well, let's do something. So that was when I thought let's work with young people and let's, you know, go into schools and so that was it. So really that was how I got to be what I do and I've created stories in action and what I do is I create stories collaboratively with classes. So in the junior classes it's with 20 kids or 30 kids how many there are at a kindy and in schools it's two classes at a time and then the other thing I do is just play. Like that's the only, like I just play in the moment with everything. Fantastic. And I think you've got some images to share with us of stories in action. Reminding me. Yeah, can we bring those up? So what we do is I've just given you because of the time I've just given you what we came up with at Dovdale School and this is a part of the story. So you'll see that I create the story and then they have another finish. So what they did was they got the fisherman out of the boat because he was fishing in a marine reserve and tipped him overboard and you can see that there were scientists at the bottom of the ocean. They were doing some studies and they thought, oh, there's a fisherman going by. Better do something. And so they brought him into the submarine and they revived him with some eels. Pretty amazing stuff. And then they brought him up onto the beach and said, you realise you were fishing in a marine reserve and I just love the next slide, which just says a hat was floating away. So I just play with what they come up with and the rest of the story was, you know, so that's that. And then this was another story I did about Rotorua Island. So what happened with Rotorua Island? It's up in the Haareke Gulf. It's a sanctuary which, you know, we take animals from the mainland and take them to Rotorua Island. And yeah, so then what they had to do is we... what happened to the animals once they got to the island. So these are shore skinks, so they were drawing what they thought they would come up with. And this slide on the other side, you'll get to have a play with this if we've got a bit of time. I've just got a few resources because in order to make up a story, you've got to have some resources to do that. So that's that. And then this is what she came up with. She said that you put them into a hotel. You go...there's four different layers and there's a little acorn there as well. And, you know, they could go out in case they see the stout. And, you know, it's very secure and very much like home. But this was their creation that they came up with. And then this other person, you know, just one little slide about, you know, this is all perfect. You know, we've got the green trees. You know, perfect life. Beautiful. Thank you, Robin. Yeah, give it up. I like cryptic stories too. Bill, tell us what you're doing before Next and how it's informed the way that you think about that project. Yeah, okay. And to...well, maybe start at the end. I mean, I'm involved with a philanthropic organisation called Next which is involved in environment and education. So I think the reason that Yosef asked us to come up here was we're both involved in environmental education. And as Robin pointed out to me, I've only been involved with Next for a year and a half or so. And she pointed out to me when I came home and said I was joining Next that I was following her in her footsteps in terms of the environmental education. And that's the...that is... that's, you know, true and based on fact. And it's one of the nice things for us is that we've both got very much an interest in that. But our backgrounds and our careers up to then have been very different. Mine prior to Next was for 20 years really an investment of a company called Direct Capital that's involved in private company investment and private equity. And so many people viewed the change from Direct Capital to Next as being a 180-degree change of direction. It is in the sense of going from financial returns to ecological and educational returns. But in other respects, you know, I talk to it as more of a 30-degree change of direction because the way that Next is operating and for my good fortune what the board of Next were looking for was somebody who had investment and business background. And that is the sort of approach that we bring to making the grants that we are making in Next Foundation. So, you know, I understand when people sit and look at my previous background they say, well, you seem to have jumped across the ditch but I don't view it that way and I view it as great good fortune actually that the board was looking for somebody with that background when they were sitting Next up. And you've been in the job 18 months as I understand it. You've had a bit of a chance to look around at what's happening in New Zealand. Where are you seeing the real high potential areas in the education space at the moment? Well, let me preface that with the fact that what you've said is 18 months so I am no expert. It wasn't a complete... I did actually have a year teaching myself in one of my first careers and I come from a family of teachers and educators and I married an educator so it's not a completely foreign space to me and it's one I've always been interested in and part of the reason and part of the answer to your question, Billy, is I had the view that technology is just radically changing education and going to and we're only at the beginning of the road in terms of that. And so it was an area that I thought was really interesting and it's one of the areas that at Next we are looking to get engaged in is how technology is having an impact on education and one of the programs we're supporting is a digital literacy program for teachers here in New Zealand because our initial teacher education and our teacher training in New Zealand that goes on at the moment doesn't have any digital education component at all which is amazing and is going to change but an organisation called the MindLab is doing something about that now and we're proud to be supporting them. So where do we see the one of the questions we ask ourselves at Next is what are we bringing to the table in an education sense other than the obvious one of funding and our answer to that question is based in our business life background and in many ways around things like execution and project management and those skills and in an educational context I think there's a lot of things that can be taken out of business that can be brought to educational initiatives that can really make a difference and if I give you one example of a conversation that's going on now not a group we've made a commitment to yet but we had three applications last year from teaching programs which were all had a similar philosophy if I call it a learning to learn philosophy all independent all in initial stages in New Zealand ones in 20 schools ones in half a dozen ones in offshore program that had been given to about 400 teachers here in New Zealand but all really in their fledgling stage but when we received the three applications we said actually all three of them have got the same challenge around scaling up and execution by educational visionaries who didn't have that capability so we're in a conversation with the three of them about whether or not we can support them via what we're calling a scaling accelerator which will help the three of them go from the initial stage that they're at now to a much greater scale in a New Zealand context and if they can be proven to do that in a powerful way and we have a powerful conversation with the Ministry of Education then over time that might be something that the Ministry of Education might pick up and take to a national level so where I see we can make a difference with in education is helping the development end of the research and development phase happen. Ministries and department aren't really set up for that they're not allowed to make mistakes they're not generally they're not generally attracting people who have got that sort of capability and expertise so that's something that we see we can help with outside the system while talking while working with the system. Fantastic thanks Bill Robin what's exciting you at the moment about this space for all your work taking you in the next few years Okay so I think the thing is is that what excites me about this whole young people thing is that they actually learn and they don't realise that they're learning so what's happening is that they learn ecology, they learn literacy they learn te reo and theatre work I'm really big on theatre work I've just recently done some post-grad working towards a masters at the moment drama teachers traditionally have had it that we can't do drama and all teachers when just don't want to go there but it's just so easy so I think that's really what I'm such a drama queen but really I just want to make it easy for teachers and that's the direction I want to go and then also have it fun for the young people and I just think the other thing is just really love the young people I mean there is something else possible after. Okay so I'm seeing a picture of growing momentum. I feel like there's a bunch of good initiatives around the country I think the work that NEXT is doing getting in behind people certainly the support that I've been lucky to receive the projects I've been involved in the work that New Frontiers and Kiwi Connects doing how do we build on this momentum going forward where are you seeing the blocks and how do we sidestep them or roll over them or start another conversation? I think not a block but something to always have top of mind in dealing with in the area of education multidisciplinary and educational norms don't go together naturally and I think it's one of the great powers of New Frontiers and one of the things I think we all appreciate about it is it's multidisciplinary and it's bringing people from different applications and so many of the people who are up here on stage over the time that I've been here are really drawing on a whole lot of different inputs in terms of whatever they bring out and that's not something that educational institutions are that well set up to deliver and so that's something that I think we are as a philanthropic organisation that's sitting outside the education system and without the sort of requirements that a ministry has of having to take a whole of the nation approach and not make mistakes about what's going to turn up in the paper we're in a very fortunate position in terms of being able to draw on a number of different sources and to support organisations that are doing things so I do see that and Dev Academy and Inspiral and the things that are going on there are a fantastic example of that I think you're doing that and we're really delivering there a new model of education a lot of what we're doing we're supporting things like professional leadership development for teachers, digital literacy for teachers an initiative across the district of Rotorua which is about collaboration between the 50 schools in Rotorua we're supporting things that we see as being areas of need and the education improvements in terms of the model things like Dev Academy drawing on that multidisciplinary base and coming up with new models which I very much think of the future Robin how do you think we build from here for stories in action so I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing now producing four books from four ecosystems there's a plate to work from a platform to work from and then the young people can then finish the stories, they can pull the story apart and work with artists and all this is what I'm going to show you just on my thing here so this is an impression of a New Zealand scene with an artist that's put in the river and then the kids, the young people can put in the animals I only want also technology to be part of stories in action so I really want the young people to actually start creating pictures like this and this is the artist that we're using Laurie Davis from Nelson and I love the way that she's done all those creatures and then this is the tui that she's done for me in the Tuatara but the young people can put those in the stories and then they can start as you saw in earlier one that they can use their own as well and that's just the resource that you might use to work with later and really have the young people be really interactive programs and have them run the show that's it and just love them Thank you