Hon David Cunliffe
Minister of Communications

Communications Minister David Cunliffe has warmly welcomed home three Otara teenagers chosen by their international peers to be ambassadors for a teen technology summit held in Boston.

Lole Lolesio, Richard Moon and Ngawai Manuel represented New Zealand at the Intel Computer Clubhouse Network's Teen Summit, attended by about 250 others from 19 countries.

"They were chosen as the global youth ambassadors for the summit," Mr Cunliffe said.

"It meant they were the face of the summit and fronted the international media during it. It was a remarkable honour and I am told they did us proud, putting across the message that New Zealand gets things done and Kiwi kids are cool."

Lole, Richard and Ngawai returned to New Zealand from the week-long summit today. Mr Cunliffe was among those who welcomed them at Auckland airport.

They are members of Computer Clubhouse 274, the first such New Zealand clubhouse of a worldwide network started in 1993 by the Media Laboratory at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston.

Computer Clubhouse 274 is based in a prefab at Clover Park Middle School in Otara, pending arranging funds for a purpose-built structure on the site.

"Clubhouses are sited in low-income or 'under-served' areas and are a grassroots, bottom-up way of bringing technology to all parts of society and bridging the digitial divide," Mr Cunliffe said.

"While at the summit, Lole worked on a new integrated processor for robots, Ngawai with digital story-telling that captured her heritage in digital form and Richard was involved in using technology to promote youth messages.

"I am very impressed with the work they did there, their being chosen as ambassadors for the summit and with the wonderful way they acted as ambassadors for New Zealand. They can be very proud of themselves."

ENDS

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