Thursday 15 December 2022 2:35pm
Gabby (left) and Belinda Knapp will graduate together on Saturday, both earning a Bachelor of Teaching degree.
Children often follow in their parents’ footsteps, but one mother and daughter duo will be walking side by side this weekend.
Belinda and daughter Gabby (21) Knapp, of Edendale, will both graduate with a Bachelor of Teaching (BTchg) from the University of Otago on Saturday.
Becoming a teacher has always been the plan for Gabby, who enjoyed working with children throughout high school, while Belinda saw it as an opportunity to advance her career.
“Gabby and I went down to the open day at the University’s Invercargill campus for her to look,” Belinda says.
“And after coming out of that I was like ‘that’s do-able’, because with a family I thought it would be quite hard to study.”
Belinda was keen to enrol but hesitant, as she did not want to “cramp Gabby’s style”.
“So, I just waited to see if she wanted to go to Dunedin or Invercargill to study, because I didn’t want to be in the same class as Gabby – that’d be weird,” she says, laughing.
Gabby was ready to leave home and opted to head north to Dunedin to enjoy the social aspects the campus had to offer, so Belinda enrolled in Invercargill.
Studying to become a teacher was not totally out of the blue for Belinda – she spent the three years prior working as a teacher aide.
She had worked with children via sports throughout the years and really enjoyed her role in the classroom, so thought teaching was something she would like to pursue.
Despite being on different campuses, Belinda and Gabby’s courses often lined up which meant they could lean on each other for help and support.
Gabby says it was handy having her mum studying at the same time.
“The best part about studying together is having someone in your family who knows what you’re doing." - Belinda Knapp
“If there was something that I was struggling with it was easy to call mum because she had the same lecture and could explain it to me,” she says. “It was quite good.”
Belinda agrees, saying it was nice to be able to talk to each other about their assignments and workload.
There were some challenges throughout their degrees, though.
For Belinda, the first one was getting used to studying again.
“It was getting my brain back in that scholarly environment,” she says.
“Gabby had to spend a little bit of time trying to help me write essays and stuff, just little things like that.”
Next, was the COVID-19 pandemic. Gabby moved back to Edendale for the first lockdown in 2020 and they had to adjust to online learning.
Once restrictions eased, they were happy to be back on their respective campuses and, eventually, teaching in classrooms.
The placements were a highlight for Gabby, particularly her final one at Big Rock Primary School, in Brighton, Dunedin.
It was rewarding to put all the learning she had done into practise, she says.
Belinda’s final placement was somewhat of a full circle moment – she went to Edendale Primary School, where she used to work as a teacher aide.
Despite being mother and daughter, they were unsure if they had similar teaching traits.
However, Belinda says it is something they are keen to find out.
“We’ve always said we want to be able to see each other in our classrooms just to see the difference in how we do both teach,” she says.
“I think there will be some quite big differences.”
They might not get the chance for a while though, as they will be teaching in different parts of the South Island next year.
Gabby has secured a job teaching year 8 pupils at Ashburton Intermediate School and Belinda will teach year 7 and 8 pupils in Gore.
Gabby says she is thrilled with her new job and is looking forward to getting started.
Belinda agrees.
“I think it will be a really long couple of months now just kind of waiting for the end of January to roll around so we can get in there.”
But first they will graduate together before heading their separate ways.
They plan on walking down George St in the parade together and because they share a last name, will likely be sitting next to each other in the ceremony.
Graduating side by side will be a fitting way to end the past three years.
“The best part about studying together is having someone in your family who knows what you’re doing,” Belinda says.
“We can talk shop and everybody else’s eyes’ sort of glaze over and they don’t know what we’re talking about.
“It’s been really special.”
- Kōrero by Jessica Wilson