People at WaiPRU

Introducing the team of researchers, postgraduate students, and professional staff involved with the Waikato Picturebook Research Unit at The University of Waikato.

Unit Directors

Professor Nicola Daly
Professor Nicola Daly

Professor

+64 7 838 4298

Janette Kelly-Ware

Dr Janette Kelly-Ware is a recently retired ECE Lecturer from the University of Waikato Faculty of Education. After 17 years she has returned to her initial career - nowadays as a day-to-day reliever in kindergartens and not-for-profit ECE settings. Her lifelong love of picturebooks led to her engaging in research about their use with student teachers, alongside teachers in Pasifika kindergartens, and supporting Summer Scholars. A key highlight over the past decade has been serving as the Co-Director of WaiPRU with Nicola Daly. The annual seminar, meeting authors, illustrators, publishers, librarians and teachers, picturebook club and various other picturebook related events have added richness and depth to her life.

Unit Members

Dr Nic Vanderschantz
Dr Nic Vanderschantz

Senior Lecturer, Programme Lead

Dr Julie Barbour
Dr Julie Barbour

Senior Lecturer

Affiliates

  • Marilyn Blakeney-Williams
  • Kate Morgan
  • Sonja Arndt
  • Joyce Bainbridge
  • Penni Cotton
  • Christine Hélot
  • Petros Panou
  • Raymonde Sneddon
  • Åse Marie Ommundsen
  • Ahonuku Associate Professor Darryn Joseph

  • Siwan M. Rosser is Senior Lecturer and Deputy Head at the School of Welsh, Cardiff University. Her main research interests focus on literature for children and young adults in the context of linguistic marginalisation. She has published on constructions of the child and childhood in 19th-century Welsh literature, nationhood and the Welsh Robinsonade, and Welsh translations of Roald Dahl. Her recent report on Welsh-language children's publishing currently informs the Welsh Books Council's strategy to promote and diversify children's reading experiences in Wales.

  • Ilid Haf is a researcher and current PhD student in the School of Welsh in Cardiff University, focussing on research into children’s literature. Her MA thesis explored the position of bilingual Welsh-English picturebooks in the publishing market in Wales and their reception. She also works for the Books Council of Wales in the Children’s Books and Reading Promotion department.