Tongan graduate first Pasifika student to finish Auckland commerce and sport conjoint

Meleana Payn is the first Pasifika student to graduate with a conjoint Bachelor of Commerce and Bachelor of Sport, Health and Physical Education from Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland, the university said.

Payn is a first-generation New Zealand-born Tongan with family roots in Mailetaha, Tongatapu, and Neiafu, Vava'u. She is the youngest of five children and the only daughter of Siliva and Joyce Payn.

She said her maternal grandfather, Kapeliele Cocker, moved to New Zealand in the late 1960s, like many Polynesian migrants seeking a better life, and that what she had achieved rested on the opportunities he helped create.

Payn said tertiary study was an expectation in her household from the day she was born. Her parents did not have the same educational opportunities growing up in Tonga, she said.

According to the release, Payn credits the Tuakana Business and Commerce 'o Pasifika programme and Pasifika Success within Sport, Health and Physical Education with helping her through her studies.

Through those programmes she worked with mentors including Lisa Filitonga, Uili Uili, Sione Taufa, Pelimani Fisi'iahi, Meleana Puloka and lecturer Dr Jean Uasike M Allen. She said one of them often tells students to find their university family, and that she had two.

Payn also completed the TupuToa Internship Programme, with mentors from Adidas and TVNZ, the release said.

"It is an honour to be among the first Pasifika graduates to complete this conjoint pathway. But being first is not really what matters most," Payn said. "What matters is creating pathways where our people can see themselves succeeding and feel confident enough to take up space in those places themselves."

She is now studying a Master of Business in Sport Leadership and Management at Auckland University of Technology. Her research interests are in increasing opportunities for Pacific peoples in sport leadership and management, influenced by her father's involvement in rugby in Tonga and New Zealand.

Payn also continues as Tuakana Business Head Tutor Pacific, her third year with the team and her first in that role. She said the work lets her take part in the academic progress of Maori and Pacific students.

She said the graduation was a collective achievement, and thanked her parents, her brothers and the wider family who supported her.

The release does not give the date of the graduation ceremony or the year Payn began her studies.