Anna has taught for over 20 years in a variety of roles, many of which have centred around supporting and extending students, dependent on their individual needs. This has included many years teaching ESOL, as well as literacy, e-learning and junior gifted students within the mainstream primary school. 

Her journey with giftedness began with her own children and her oldest son attended both One Day School and Gifted Kids, the precursors to MindPlus.  His experience and Anna's observations of friends and other students she taught in her own classrooms and groups has sparked an enduring interest in giftedness, and particularly those diagnosed as twice exceptional and those who sit outside the norms of traditional primary schooling. She hopes to be able to encourage, ignite and extend passions in gifted students through MindPlus and to be able to support and share the hopes of parents.

Joining the Mind Plus team in 2018, Anna is excited to be learning alongside other very skilled, experienced and passionate teachers in the NZCGE community and feels privileged to be able to support others in their giftedness journey.

Ashle did her teacher training in America and began teaching in 2007. She has always worked under the umbrella of special education, so she is particularly adept at motivating and engaging "non-traditional" learners. Ashle’s initial teaching qualification was in secondary education, but she has a master's degree in Special Education, and Ed.D. in Deaf Education.

While Ashle lived in America her experience with teaching was at a high school level. Since moving to New Zealand she has had the opportunity to work with children from new entrants through to high school. Ashle has also been able to get a bit of experience with early childhood education by doing some reliving at her children’s day care.

Ashle has two boys of her own, the oldest of whom has been attending Small Poppies since the start of 2017.  This is beneficial to Ashle as she can be especially compassionate and empathetic with parents as she is walking this whole gifted "journey" alongside them.

Ashle is particularly passionate about getting young learners to tap into their social and emotional intelligence, as well as just finding what interests them and running with it.
New Zealand Centre for Gifted education is proud to have a great team of educators such as Ashle behind them to encourage our gifted children to reach their potential.

Cathryn has a broad range of skills and experience gained through a diverse range of teaching roles from primary to tertiary level, including: classroom teaching (regular classes, both single and multi-year level, and specialist gifted education at Gifted Kids), one-to-one private tutoring, and remedial support for students with specific learning disabilities (SLD). She is passionate about identifying and supporting students who are “twice exceptional” (gifted with a SLD), as these students’ complex needs are often overlooked within our education system. In addition to her teaching qualifications, Cathryn holds a Post-graduate Diploma in Science (Cognitive and Behavioural Neuroscience), is an accredited Level C Assessor and a SPELD tutor.

Sarah is an experienced and enthusiastic teacher who has taught in both mainstream and Montessori classrooms in Australia and New Zealand. She holds a Post-graduate Diploma in Gifted and Talented Education as well as degrees in Science and Education. During her Science study, Sarah undertook post graduate work on a sub-Antarctic island as part of a wider climate change research project. She has a passion for teaching junior students and is excited to be joining the NZCGE staff in 2018. Alongside teaching at MindPlus and Berhampore School, Sarah will be working towards her Masters in Gifted and Talented Education through GERRIC at the University of New South Wales.

Nomi has over 20 years’ teaching experience and joined Gifted Kids in 2011. Although her first love is History, as seen in her MA in this subject, she has totally immersed herself in Gifted Education over the past few years, researching theories of giftedness and teaching practices most suited to gifted students. She has completed a Post-graduate Diploma in Specialist Teaching (Gifted Education) through Massey University and is committed to supporting the development of new ways of thinking with her students and teaching in ways that will add more connections to the wiring of her students’ brains. Nomi is a highly reflective practitioner and has extremely high expectations of herself and her students. In addition to her experience teaching children, Nomi also taught pre-service teachers before she came to New Zealand and brings her skills and knowledge of teaching adults to her work with our Consultancy.  Nomi has recently moved from her position as Regional Lead Teacher for our Wellington Units to work as part of NZCGE’s consultancy team.  She says of her work at NZCGE, “I love that I am learning new things continuously, because it is challenging and gives sense to my life.”

Smruti joined NZCGE’s teaching staff mid-2016. Her journey in gifted education began over 13 years earlier when she taught her first primary school class in New Zealand, and a few years later she found herself parenting two gifted children! Prior to that, Smruti's passion was foreign languages and translation. She has a degree in French and Russian and recently completed a Master's degree in French on the translation of children's literature. She delights in bringing her love of languages to her students and enjoys seeing how gifted children thrive on the challenge and mental stimulation that acquiring a second or third language brings.
As well as teaching gifted students, Smruti's sees another vital aspect of her role and mission as supporting and providing assistance to parents of gifted children, She feels great empathy for those who face the every day challenges and emotions of parenting and advocating for a gifted child. Smruti has a strong interest in twice exceptionality and hopes to pursue postgraduate studies and research in this area.
In joining the team at NZCGE, Smruti feels that she has finally found her tribe and can't believe that she gets to work with such diverse, intelligent and passionate people who all share the same dream, and who teach and share what they know with an open heart.

Sue is the Lead Teacher of Small Poppies, which came under the umbrella of NZCGE in 2014. She has been teaching for over 40 years, involved in gifted education for over 30 years and has two gifted children, now fully grown with their own children. Since 1996 she has worked fulltime in gifted education, primarily teaching the Small Poppies programme. Sue is a life member of both the New Zealand Association for Gifted Children (NZAGC) and Explorers, the Auckland Branch of NZAGC; has served as NZAGC National President; edited both “Tall Poppies” and “Apex”, and organized and/or presented at numerous workshops and conferences for teachers, children and parents. She was a member of the Writing Team for the Development Band of the Mathematics Curriculum Statement and coordinator of a writing team for “Supporting Scientifically Talented Students.” As Assistant Director of Tamaki Education Centre in the early 90s, she initiated subsidised programmes for gifted children from local low decile schools. Sue is a former member of the Boards of giftEDnz and the Gifted Education Centre (GEC), and was director of GEC prior to the merger of GEC and Gifted Kids. She has a special interest in creative writing, maths, science and technology, and is passionate about her role working with our young gifted children.