Dr. Paul Whitinui is an Indigenous Māori scholar from theConfederation of Tribes in the Far North of Aotearoa New Zealand (NgāPuhi, Te Aupōuri, Ngāti Kurī) on his Dad’s side, and a third generation New Zealand Pākehā(French, Irish, Welsh and English) on his Mum’s side. He grew up and went to school in a small coastal town in the Eastern Bay of Plenty of the North Island, called Whakatane alongside his four siblings, two brothers, and two sisters.He completed his BEd, BLS, and Dip. Tchg in 1997, and worked in schools as a registered teacher in the Waikato region for 11 years. During that time, he also completed his Masters in Sports and Leisure Studies at the University of Waikato in 2001, and in 2008 completed a doctorate in education from the University of Auckland. 
 
His first academic appointment was at the University of Waikato in the Sports and Leisure department in 2007 teaching in the areas of community health, physical education and health in schools, and physical activity, fitness and lifestyle. In 2010, he accepted a position as a senior lecturer in Aotahi: School of Indigenous Studies based at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch and assigned to develop a new program in Indigenous community health and development that would become an integral part of the new Health Sciences degree launched in 2013. At the end of 2012, he accepted a new leadership position as an Associate Professor in Maori Teacher Education in the College of Education based at the University of Otago, Dunedin providingprofessional and strategic leadership in Māori Teacher Education and working collaboratively with senior middle management to Indigenize existing teaching education programs. 
 
In 2015, he moved to the city of Victoria, BC where he is currently anAssociate Professor in the School of Exercise Science, Physical and Health Education (EPHE) based at the University of Victoria. Dr. Whitinui is an interdisciplinary researcher with a background in sport and leisure (Sociology), Indigenous health and development (Indigenous Studies), and Indigenous teacher education (Education). He is author of numerous journal articles and has had published four books including:Promising Practices in Indigenous Teacher Education(Singapore: Springer, 2018), Ara Mai he Tētēkura - Visioning our futures: New and emerging pathways of Māori academic leadership(Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2015), Kia tangi te titi - Permission to speak: Successful schooling for Māori students in the 21stcentury: Issues, challenges and alternatives(Wellington, New Zealand Council of Educational Research, 2011), and The Indigenous factor: Exploring kapa haka as a culturally responsive learning environment in New Zealand mainstream secondary schools(Germany, VDM Publishing Company, 2008).

He is currently the lead investigator on a 2 year SSHRC Insight Development Grant in collaboration with four post-secondary institutions on Vancouver Island to create an Indigenous cultural safety impact assessment tool that can be used to monitor and improve the quality of the training over time, and is a co-investigator on 5 year CIHR grant focused on scaling up an Indigenous Mentoring Network of the Pacific Northwest to support and benefit Aboriginal Health graduate students in their research endeavours – the project is now in its second year. He is also the Chair for the World Indigenous Research Alliance (WIRA) under the auspicious of the World Indigenous Nations Higher Education Consortium (WINHEC), and has been the Editor-in-Chief for the on-line WINHEC journal since 2017; an international journal of Indigenous education scholarship. Since becoming an academic in 2007, Paul has given well over 100 presentations at various conferences across the globe, and is extremely grateful for the opportunity to give this year’s Alan Ingraham Memorial keynote.