Centre Directors

  • Liu Shusen

    CENTRE DIRECTOR

  • Liu Hongzhong

    CENTRE SECRETARY

Board Members

Professor Alister Jones (Chair)

Senior Deputy Vice-Chancellor, University of Waikato

  • Alister is currently the Senior Deputy Vice Chancellor of the University of Waikato. Amongst other responsibilities he leads international engagement and delivery with a strong focus on the Asia-Pacific regions including development of off-shore programmes and campuses. A former Dean of Education and Research Professor, Alister has had a long involvement in international education as well as building educational research capability in a number of countries. A current member of the Establishment Board of the Forum for World Education, Alister holds several professional leadership positions including adjunct professor, company directorships as well as being a member of international school advisory board in China.

Professor Paul Clark (康 浩)

Chair Professor of Chinese, University of Auckland

  • Paul Clark is Chair Professor of Chinese at the University of Auckland and ex-Director of the North Asia CAPE (Centre of Asia Pacific Excellence). Trained as an historian, his research area is contemporary China. His books include works on Māori history, Chinese film, Cultural Revolution culture, youth cultures and (forthcoming) leisure in Beijing since 1949. He was educated at Auckland, Peking and Harvard universities.

Rebecca Needham (陈立恩)

Director, Strategic Partnerships and Engagement, Victoria University of Wellington

  • In her current role, Rebecca works across the university to ensure a joined-up approach to the identification and development of the University’s domestic and international partnership initiatives. Rebecca is a central point of contact at the university for current and prospective international and New Zealand partners and stakeholders.

    Rebecca has been at Victoria University of Wellington since 2017, following a career with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, including diplomatic assignments in Beijing, Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur and Guangzhou. Over the course of her professional career, Rebecca has also worked in the private sector in South East Asia and China.

Professor Tony Ballantyne

Deputy Vice Chancellor, External Engagement, University of Otago

  • Tony is Deputy Vice-Chancellor, External Engagement at the University of Otago. Born and raised in Dunedin, Tony’s first qualification was a history honours degree from Otago. He completed his PhD at the University of Cambridge and held faculty positions at the National University of Ireland, Galway, the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and Washington University, St Louis before returning to Otago. Prior to his current role, Tony served as Head of the Department of History and Art History (2011-2015), Pro-Vice Chancellor, Humanities (2015-2021), and was also the Director of Otago’s Centre for Research on Colonial Culture. Tony is recognised as a world-leading historian of the modern British empire, who has also published extensively on colonialism and its legacies in New Zealand.

Dr Erik Lithander

Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Strategic Engagement, University of Auckland

  • Dr Erik Lithander joined the University of Auckland as Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Strategic Engagement) in November 2021. Prior to this he held the position of Pro Vice-Chancellor (Global Engagement) at the University of Bristol, Pro Vice-Chancellor (International and Outreach) at the Australian National University and Director of International Affairs at University College Dublin. Originally from Sweden, Erik holds a Candidature in Political Science from Universite Libre de Bruxelles, a BSc (Econ) from the London School of Economics and an MPhil and PhD from the University of Cambridge, where his research focused on contemporary Latin American literature. He is an alumnus of the executive education programme at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and of the LH Martin Institute at the University of Melbourne.

Monique van Veen

International Partnerships & Support Manager, University of Canterbury

  • Monique joined the NZ Centre Advisory Board in 2021. Having lived and worked across four continents, Monique’s developed a keen interest in international education, including creating equitable access to global learning opportunities. Monique’s work includes developing UC’s TNE and international partnerships portfolio. She is deeply interested in Te Ao and Mātauranga Māori (Māori world views & knowledge), and how these can be fostered to strengthen Aotearoa, New Zealand’s international education industry. Monique sits on the board of the Confucius Institute at University of Canterbury, and is a member of UN Women Aotearoa.

Marlene Lu

China Partnership Manager, AUT

  • Marlene is currently the Partnership Manager at Auckland University of Technology. She leads AUT’s China partnership and maintains and grows relationships with partners in Greater China Region. She shapes the China partnership strategies at AUT. Marlene plays a very important role in the development of AUT’s transnational programmes in China. She has a deep understanding of the cultures and educational systems of both China and New Zealand.

Christopher Carey

Executive Director, Global Engagement, Massey University

  • Chris Carey is currently the Executive Director Global Engagement at Massey University. Based at Massey’s Auckland campus, Chris leads the university’s efforts in the development of global partnerships, international student recruitment and student mobility. Chris has more than a decade of experience in the international education field in previous roles with the University of Auckland and The Ohio State University where he set up and led Ohio State’s global offices around the world including their first in Shanghai. These university positions followed roles in the private sector with Morgan Stanley and Nestlē.

Roger Shew

  • A highly experienced and globally focussed international education specialist with a work record of over 21 years success in management and business development across diverse international markets and in New Zealand.

    An accomplished leader within the university sector, senior roles over the past 15 years include: Director International Lincoln University (current), Director Marketing and Communications The Chinese University of Hong Kong Business School and Deputy Director International Office The University of Auckland.

    Roger is a multilingual and cross-culturally informed Executive with in-depth knowledge of Hong Kong and China. Roger lived and worked in Hong Kong for seven years. He has been travelling and doing higher education work in China since 2006

Education New Zealand

  • Education New Zealand Manapou ki te Ao is the crown agency responsible for taking the country’s education experiences to the world. The agency has an important leadership role in transforming and reshaping the sector as it implements a recovery plan to reset New Zealand’s international education sector, while contributing to a thriving and globally connected New Zealand through world class education. This involves promoting New Zealand education to international markets through government and industry engagement and partnerships, building academic and research relationships across the globe.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade

  • The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) acts in the world to build a safer, more prosperous and more sustainable future for New Zealanders. MFAT pursues the New Zealand Government’s international priorities and provides advice on the implications for New Zealand of what is happening in the world. Diplomatic relations between New Zealand and China date back to 1972 and today China is one of New Zealand’s most important relationships. Education links are an important aspect of the relationship and have been growing strongly over the past decade.

 

Rewi Alley Visiting Professor

PROFESSOR LAURENCE SIMMONS

Current Rewi Alley Visiting Professor

Laurence Simmons is Professor of Film Studies and former Head of the Department of Film, Television and Media Studies and Faculty of Arts Associate Dean Postgraduate at The University of Auckland. His principle teaching fields are New Zealand cinema, film theory, television theory and visual communication studies. He has written extensively on New Zealand film and is also known as a writer of numerous essays on New Zealand painting and photography as well as a curator of art exhibitions for public art galleries. He also has a strong interest in critical theory and has completed a book on Freud’s papers on art and aesthetics: Freud's Italian Journey (2006) as well as co-edited volumes of essays on the relevance of the critical theory of Jacques Derrida, Jean Baudrillard and Slavoj Zizek. He has published over 40 referred journal articles and his latest books include the edited volume Speaking Truth to Power: Public intellectuals rethink New Zealand (2007), Tuhituhi (2011) on the painter William Hodges who journeyed with Captain James Cook on his second voyage to the South Pacific and Zizek through Hitchcock (forthcoming). Professor Simmons has been awarded two Creative New Zealand grants, a Senior Fulbright Fellowship and Visiting Scholar awards at the universities of UCLA Santa Barbara, Australian National University and the University of Cambridge.

Visiting Fellows

 

2019

Mo (Janelle) Li – Massey University

Christian Felzensztein – Massey University

Wanglin Ma – Lincoln University

Naresh Singhal – Auckland University

Tek Tjing Lie – Auckland University of Technology

Jaspreet Dhupia – Auckland University

David Johnston – Massey University

Rose Martin – Auckland University

Mike Webster – Auckland University

Amjed Tahir – Massey University

 

Pavel Castika – Canterbury University

Nikola Kasabov – Auckland University of Technology

Don Kulasiri – Lincoln University

Michael Li – Massey University

Stephen Noakes – Auckland University

Christopher Pearson – Otago University

Hazel Tucker – Otago University

Danping Wang – Auckland University

Sally Norman – Victoria University Wellington

2018

 

2017

 

Zhi Dong – Auckland University

Sharyn Davies – Auckland University of Technology

Michaela Balzarova – Canterbury University

Barry Wu – Canterbury University

David Grubber – Massey University

Sally Liu – Massey University

Boyang Ding – Otago University

Liyin Liang – Waikato University

 

2016

 

Jeremy Piggott – Otago University

Stephen Marsland – Victoria University Wellington

Anirudda Chatterjee – Otago University

Brian Moloughney – Otago University

Marco Brenna – Otago University

Ting Wang – Otago University

Ruili Wang – Massey University

Stephen Cummings – Victoria University Wellington

Ralph Buck – Auckland University

 

2015

 

Austina Clark – Otago University

Seyed Ali Mirjalili – Auckland University

Nicholas Khoo – Otago University

Christian Hartinger – Auckland

 

2014

 

Margot Skinner – Otago University

Hongzhi Gao – Victoria University Wellington

Douglas Pratt – Massey University

Susan Krumdieck – Canterbury University

Jeremy Seligman – Auckland University

2013

Manfredo Manfredini – Auckland University

 

Anne-Marie Brady – Canterbury University

2012

Liaison Interns

Claudia Mason

Dillon Anderson

Jaffar Al-Shammery

Elizabeth (Libby) English

Haluk (Luke) Gokcen

2019

 

Samantha Steel

Tony Fiddis

Mia Chung

Daniel Cullen

2018

 

2017

 

Cameron Toogood

Matilda Gaby

Megan Kuei Hawkins

Tony Fiddis

Alex Walsh

 

2016

Oliver Cowie

Samantha Steel

Soo Hyun (Cathie) Chun

Tae Joon Yoon

 

2015

 

Alex Cheah

Tammy Groves

 

2014

Charles Rowe

Sophie Mazzone-Olissoff

 

2013

Charles Rowe

Kristen Ng

Simon Robinson

 

2012

Emily Foate

Simon Robinson

 

2011

 

Sam McKay

Emily Foate

 

2010

 

Charlie Gao

 

Charlie Gao

2009