Wearable arts collaboration: Background
CP1002
The workroom at Wellington High School
Wellington High School, a co-educational school of approximately 1,000 students, is located in the inner city suburb of Mt Cook. All year 9 students take technology, in which they do a term each of food, design, fashion, and graphics. These are offered as option subjects in year 10, and students taking fashion technology can continue into the fashion textile design technology courses in years 11-13.
Queen Margaret College, an independent Presbyterian girls' school sited in the central city suburb of Thorndon, has a roll of approximately 650 year 1-13 students. Technology is compulsory at years 7-9, and materials technology is offered as an option subject at Years 10-13.
Barbara Knight, HOD Technology at Queen Margaret, had worked with the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in 2005, when her Year 11 class developed souvenir items for their client, the Te Papa store. The following year two students from that class created a wearable arts display for Te Papa's front windows (see the case study BP632 Te Papa wearable arts). And in 2007, two Year 13 students developed another wearable arts display for the museum (see the 2007 Dominion Post article).
Barbara's career started with her study in Fashion Design and Technology at Wellington Polytechnic (now Massey University School of Design). After completing her diploma she worked as a pattern-maker and designer for a leather company, then decided to move into teaching and trained at Wellington Teachers' College. Barbara's first teaching position was at Kapiti College, and she joined Queen Margaret College as Materials Technology teacher in 2003, becoming HOD Technology in 2005. Barbara has also been involved in national moderation and external assessment for NCEA Technology.
Barbara met fellow Technology teacher Kylie Merrick when they were both studying fashion design at Polytech, and the pair remained in contact over the years. Kylie went on to work as a freelance designer in Wellington, creating shop window displays and exhibition installations amongst other things. She later returned to the Polytech as a part-time lecturer in fashion design. Kylie says she enjoyed this aspect of her work so much that she decided to teach at secondary school level and did teacher training at Wellington Teachers' College. Kylie started teaching at Hutt Valley High School, and moved to Wellington High School in 2003 as fashion design technology teacher. When she was lecturing part-time at Massey, she continued doing a wide range of freelance design work. In addition, she has worked at various times in facilitating, moderating, and examining roles for NZQA.