Dan joins our team as a research and evaluation assistant. His varied experience includes social policy research, particularly about labour history. He also has a background in yoga teaching, massage therapy and landscaping.
"I've always been passionate about equality and social justice"
Dan was born in Palmerston North and raised (with his younger brother) by his mother in Awapuni, and attended local schools: Awapuni Primary, Monrad Intermediate, Palmerston North Boys High, and Awatapu College. Dan worked as an apprentice engineer with his father before leaving to go to Australia for work in 1999. Returning to Aotearoa in 2004, Dan decided to change career path and went to UCOL polytechnic to gain a therapeutic massage qualification. This was soon followed by an invitation to teach yoga (still teaching) and then tai chi, all of which coincided with starting a family. Dan spent 7 years on the school board of his daughter's primary school which sparked an interest in social policy. Following some big life changes, Dan decided that university was his best option and completed his BA in social policy at Massey University in 2021. Dan has since gone on to study for a MA in social policy. During this time, Dan has started a new chapter and family. During his studies Dan was employed as a research assistant for a Marsden funded project exploring labour history in Aotearoa New Zealand. He also contributed to two Pacific research projects.
The work Dan is proud of includes:
- Being self-employed for 20 years as a yoga teacher, massage therapist, and occasionally, a landscape gardener.
- Being a board member at his daughter's primary school for 7 years, and coaching netball, t-ball, and touch rugby.
- Completing BA social policy and MA social policy as a mature student. Dan's masters research used a history-from-below approach to investigate the 1980 Kinleith Strike. A history-from-below approach to research requires locating and documenting the voices of ordinary people otherwise marginalised or ignored in the historical record, including the actions and contributions of women, Māori, and Pacific Peoples.
