Industry Connections
In-house opportunities: Mel Meates supports and enhances the rainbow community through a research action group and industry connections.
UCOL engages with the community and industry in many ways. When studying nursing, for example, students are required to complete placements. In Mel Meates’ case, there was the added extracurricular learning through an action research project run by Nursing Lecturer Trish Morrison. Mel was able to connect their lived experience to the nursing community through discussions, presentations, and workshops.
Mel started their journey through the personal struggles and challenges associated with being a transgender person in the health system. These experiences motivated Mel to make a difference and do what they could to improve the situation for others. Through a fortuitous choice of a research project that Trish was working on - “How can engagement with the community influence an existing nursing education programme to ensure quality health care for transgender patients?” - Mel had the opportunity to engage, talk about and explore improvements in an area they were passionate about, the rainbow community. Through being involved in this action research, their confidence grew, and they discovered additional issues they had never thought of and opportunities to affect change. This group wasn’t just about being a research group; Trish wanted participants to gain skills and additional opportunities.
Mel’s engagement (along with Trish and other staff members Judith Bignell, Riki Anderson, Tracey Cook and wellbeing student Skye Shaddix) with the community led to changes to include gender diversity in the nursing and wellbeing curriculums at UCOL. Mel presented this newly developed content, which was beneficial for students. Trish spoke about Mel’s approach regarding communicating their experiences as being “gentle and respectful when talking about and representing the rainbow community”. This has enabled a variety of groups to embrace the information given by Mel and to apply this knowledge to improve experiences for a range of future patients.
The group, drawing on its members' industry expertise, also developed a workshop for the wider staff at UCOL. This led to Mel, a person with lived experience, becoming a “Rainbow Diversity Trainer” at UCOL and a “Rainbow Education Facilitator” for the District Health Board.
Mel has campaigned to the Nursing Council of New Zealand to ask them to consider adding “gender identity” into Article Competency 1.5 of the Nursing Council nursing competencies. This is now being openly discussed and explored, and it also led to Mel and Trish presenting rainbow diversity training to the Nursing Council of New Zealand. Mel finds inspiration in “personally and professionally being able to make a difference.” Embrace opportunities because “you never know where things lead to.”
Mel’s primary focus is on building industry connections that can impact not only their life but the lives of others. In this interview, Mel discussed how diversity in the workplace is considered important in New Zealand, but scholarships and funding remain limited. Minimal scholarships are available to students who are non-school leavers, students over 40, or specifically for the rainbow community. Their question is: “Do you think you could help offer a scholarship to UCOL rainbow students?”