Skip Content
TWoA Tauranga campus Tauranga City Accessibility Awards

The Tauranga campus of Te Wānanga o Aotearoa has picked up another award.

The campus - which opened in 2016 - has previously been recognised for its design in the 2016 Waikato/Bay of Plenty Architectural Awards and late last year it was judged the winner of the Accessible and Inclusive Building category at the inaugural Tauranga City Accessibility Awards.

The awards were launched in 2017 by the city’s Disability Advisory Group, which works with the Tauranga City Council on the implementation of its Disability Strategy. They aim to celebrate business owners who have made accessibility a feature of their new building, organisers say.

Judges were impressed with the design, layout and accessibility of the campus and felt it embraced Universal Design principles and was an outstanding example of a building which was accommodating to students, who live with a disability.

Regional operations manager Murray Rillstone says the campus architects – Wingate Architects - factored accessibility into the initial design and the benefits were clear.

“It gives all our tauira equal opportunity to have a learning experience with Te Wānanga o Aotearoa,” he says.

“Since it’s brand new, we had the opportunity to add these accessibility concepts to the design. It was the first time we’ve been able to build something from the ground up. Our other sites have been pre-existing or modified.”

Judges made only two recommendations to further improve accessibility: signage for disability bathrooms and a small ramp down from the classrooms to the outdoor concourse.

Murray says it was good to get the feedback from the judges and “those are things we can work on”.

 Back to news & events

Published On:

Article By:



Other Articles

  • 27 March 2025

    A whakairo journey shaped by art and community

    Murray ‘Muzz’ Green (Te Kanawa, Ngāti Maniapoto, Whatakaraka, Ngāti Mahuta, Ngāti Te Kiriwai, Ngāti Tuwharetoa, Ngāti Rangitihi, Ngāti Ngutū, Whānau-a-Apanui and Ngāti Porou) left school at 15 when he realised conventional education wasn’t for him.

  • 20 March 2025

    Nāwai i tauira, kua kaiako

    Ahakoa he rerekē noa atu te ao i tipu ake ai a Rob Bromley i tāna e mōhio nei i tēnei rā, nō te ohinga ake, ka rongo ia i tētahi hao ki te reo Māori.

  • 10 March 2025

    Te Wānanga o Aotearoa recognised as leader in Māori HR

    Te Wānanga o Aotearoa was awarded the prestigious Mana Tangata Award at the 2025 NZ HR Excellence Awards on Thursday 27 February in Tāmaki Makaurau.

  • 06 March 2025

    A kaiako who built more than a course

    When Peter Waaka arrived in Queenstown many years ago, with a career spanning government work, hotel management, and Māori development teaching wasn’t on his radar. But life has a way of leading us in unexpected directions, and for Peter, that was helping tauira turn their business ideas into reality.