Staff Profiles

Richard D. Bedford
BA, MA Auck, PhD ANU
Professor and Director of Population Studies Centre

Room: K3.25
Telephone: +64 7 838 4770
Email: rdb@waikato.ac.nz

Professor Richard Bedford has been Professor of Geography at the University of Waikato since 1989. His undergraduate and graduate degrees are from the University of Auckland and his PhD was completed in 1971 in the Research School of Pacific Studies at the Australian National University. He is a specialist in migration studies and since the mid-1960s he has been researching processes of population movement in the Asia-Pacific region.

During the 1980s Professor Bedford was the Convenor of the Population Monitoring Group of the former New Zealand Planning Council. In 1990 he was awarded the NZ 1990 Medal for services to New Zealand. In 2000 he was elected to Fellowship of the Royal Society of New Zealand.

He is currently a member of the New Zealand National Commission for UNESCO's Social Sciences Sub-Commission, the inter-governmental International Metropolis Project, and the Royal Society of New Zealand's contact point with the International Geographical Union (IGU). He is a full member of the IGU Commission on Population and Vulnerability. In 2001 he was appointed by the Minister of Immigration as academic adviser to the Ministerial Advisory Group on Immigration, and in 2004 he was invited to chair the Government's inter-departmental Social Policy Evaluation and Research (SPEaR) Committee.

Professor Bedford is on several editorial advisory boards for journals including Population, Society and Place (UK), The Journal of Migration and Ethnic Studies (UK), the Journal of International Migration and Integration ( Canada), Australian Geographical Studies ( Australia), The Journal of Population Research ( Australia), Asia Pacific Viewpoint ( New Zealand).

Follow this link for a full list of publications related to the Migration Research Group.

Jenine Cooper
MSocSc Waikato
Research Assistant

Room: K3.27
Telephone: +64 7 838 4913
Email: jenine@waikato.ac.nz

Jenine Cooper completed her Masters thesis in anthropology in 2003, which involved working with the small Congolese communities in Auckland and Hamilton in order to understand their experiences as recent immigrants to New Zealand and put their 'voice' to those experiences. The research provided Ms Cooper with the opportunity to participate in community events within the Congolese community and the wider African community within Hamilton.

Since joining the Migration Research Group Jenine has strengthened her research administration skills and expanded her research relationship with other ethnic communities. She contributed to the research project on mental health issues for Asians in New Zealand in 2002. In 2004 she coordinated the qualitative research on community perception of international students, which was carried out in four cities and involved 76 businesses and the completion of 37 key informant interviews with government and local government organisations such as police and the city councils, service providers and community groups. Other projects have included the health issues of migrants and refugees in the Waikato region, and a literature review Managing Diversity in the Multicultural Classroom for the Ministry of Education. In 2005, Jenine began coordinating a research project which investigates eight ethnic communities' perceptions of the New Zealand Police across four cities.

Elsie Ho
MNZM
Senior Research Fellow

Room: K3.24
Telephone: +64 7 838 4466, ext. 8396
Email: elsieho@waikato.ac.nz

Dr Elsie Ho is a foundation member of the Migration Research Group where she has been based since 1990. She has previously held teaching appointment at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and her PhD was completed in 1995 at the University of Waikato. Dr Ho is a leading expert in migration studies in New Zealand, and has been researching the cross-cultural transition and adaptation of Asian immigrants and international students for over a decade. She has published widely on the topics of Asian transnational communities, acculturation, migrant settlement, identity development and mental health, as well as diversity issues in the workplace and in the classrooms. Her research projects have been funded from a variety of sources, including multi-year grants from the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology (FRST), the Health Research Council (HRC), the Marsden Fund and contract funding from a range of policy-focused government agencies and community organizations such as the Department of Labour, the New Zealand Police, the Mental Health Commission, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education, Education New Zealand, the Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) and the Asia New Zealand Foundation. 
In 2007, Dr Ho was awarded Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to migrant communities. Currently she is one of two Objective Leaders (with Professor Richard Bedford) of the FRST-funded Strangers in Town research programme (2002-08). She is also one of two Principal Investigators (with Professor Jacques Poot) of the Marsden-funded Settlement and Circulation of New Zealanders Living in Australia programme (2005-2007). In addition, She also contributes to the following research programmes: the FRST-funded Economic Integration of Immigrants programme led by Paul Spoonley from Massey University (2007-2012), the FRST-funded Empowering Older People to Repair and Maintain Safe and Comfortable Houses in their Communities programme led by Kay Saville-Smith from the Centre for Research, Evaluation and Social Assessment (2007-2012), and a research programme on Chinese Circulatory Transmigration funded by the Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange and led by Manying Ip of the University of Auckland (2007-2010).   

Follow this link for a full list of publications related to the Migration Research Group.

Muriaroha Muntz
BSocSc Waikato
Research Assistant

Room: K3.22
Telephone: +64 7 838 4466, ext. 6296
Email: murim@waikato.ac.nz

Wendy Li
MSocSc Waikato
PhD Candidate

Room: K3.22
Email: wl116@waikato.ac.nz

Wendy Li is a PhD candidate at the Population Studies. Wendy was born in China and immigrated to New Zealand in 2003. During her 17 years working in social science fields, Wendy spent 14 years in a tertiary institution in Guangzhou, China, doing research into social psychology, women studies and policy analysis, and was a senior lecturer in the institution. Wendy worked as a counselor providing counseling to Asian population affected by problem gambling from 2004 to 2007. She has written and co-authored a number of publications on social psychology, women studies and community psychology.

Colin McLeay
BSocSc, MSocSc Waikato, PhD Macquarie
Lecturer

Room: I2.10
Telephone: +64 7 838 4466, ext. 8436
Email: c.mcleay@waikato.ac.nz

Dr Colin McLeay joined the lecturing staff of the Department of Geography, University of Waikato , Hamilton , in 1995. Between 1999 and 2006 Colin was based in the Bay of Plenty , teaching across all areas of geography at the Tauranga campus of the university. In January 2006 Colin returned to the Hamilton campus of the University of Waikato where he teaches in areas of cultural, economic, and migration geographies. Having completed a PhD at Macquarie University in Australia that explored the globalising activities of record companies, Colin retains a keen interest in processes of globalisation and the nature of the cultural production sector.

More recently Colin's research has focused on understanding possible growth options for urban areas in both New Zealand and Australia . Colin is particularly interested in developing an understanding of migration to and from cities and towns in New Zealand 's sun-belt regions. Compared with Australia and the United States , where the rapid growth of sun-belt regions has been well-documented over many years, there is a paucity of published research on New Zealand 's sun-belt centres. By building a profile of the growth trends of local sun-belt areas Colin will be able to make comparisons between local trends and overseas experiences. Consideration of what is happening in New Zealand in light of what has been experienced overseas will allow for the development of possible futures for New Zealand 's high-growth sun-belt centres.

Follow this link for a full list of publications related to the Migration Research Group.