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Mate atu he tētē kura, ara mai he tētē kura

2022-09-29

Aleisha and Chris speaking at Te Tiriti in Tech in 2019

Written by Aleisha Amohia and Chris Cormack

The Catalyst Koha team is excited to announce that Aleisha Amohia has been named our new Koha Technical Lead, taking over Chris Cormack who will be adopting his Kaihuawaere Matihiko role full-time.

Mate atu he tētē kura, ara mai he tētē kura - when one goes, another takes their place.

Aleisha has been in the Catalyst Koha team and contributing to Koha for over 8.5 years. You've no doubt seen her around, whether it was speaking at Kohacon, co-facilitating training, fixing bugs, writing blog posts, or developing new enhancements and features such as recalls for Koha. She started out at the Catalyst Open Source Academy as a high school student exploring an interest in the technology sector, and has worked her way up from being a part-time intern to the Technical Lead.

The Kaihuawaere Matihiko role is one that Chris began on a part-time basis in early 2020. The role allows him to focus on helping to move Catalyst to a place that is better for Māori - Māori employees, and Māori organisations with whom we work. Chris had already been working in this space alongside his work with libraries. The role quickly began requiring more of Chris' time than we'd initially planned, and it became clear that it would be better for Catalyst if Chris could give it his full time and energy. It is a testament to Catalyst's commitment to becoming a Te Tiriti o Waitangi honouring organisation that they have elevated the role to a senior management position.

Being one of the original Koha developers, this is certainly not the end of the Koha journey for Chris! While he's no longer in the Catalyst Koha team, he's still available via community forums and chat channels. He'll always be happy to talk about Koha, in fact the hard part is stopping him.

The Catalyst Koha team continues to be a group of capable, hard-working people who champion open source software and strive to ensure Koha is the best system for libraries. Evan, Kathryn, Aleisha, Wainui and Alex look forward to their continued work, helping libraries get the best out of Koha in their organisations, and for their communities.

Catalyst Koha

If you have any questions or comments about this News item, or would like some support with your Koha instance, you are welcome to email us at [email protected] (New Zealand) or [email protected] (Australia).

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