Community Liaison/Coordinator


Fixed term contract

30 hours per week – Fixed 12 months contract

Bay of Plenty’s leading community based STEM Charity

Flexible work hours with flexible remote working

Registered office based in Tauranga’s CBD


Introduction to STEM Wana Trust

A registered Charity in New Zealand working to promote awareness of opportunities in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) to young people and their families through community events, collaborations and meaningful partnerships. 

Tauranga STEM Festival (STEMFest) 2019 was the first large scale event of its kind in Aotearoa, a headline in the Trust’s portfolio of community based projects and won a Community Event Excellence award. In 2020 and 2021 we have continued to innovate with our outreach initiatives and newly established Tinkd Makerspace.

We are looking for an enthusiastic events based Community Liaison/Coordinator to assist the organising team with the planning and delivery of a series of community STEM events for 2022.

The Job

This is an opportunity for you to be fully involved in supporting STEM Wana’s mission to deliver the necessary ‘wow factor’ of STEM engagements within agreed budgets and strategic expectations. 

You will work alongside and be supervised by a Project Manager on a day to day basis, and have regular interactions with the Creative Director and Board of Trustees.

We are seeking a self-starter with experience in administration and events coordination. A person who has an enquiring mind and can rapidly draw together information from different sources to identify opportunities.

This is a fantastic opportunity to assist in delivering some innovative and impactful events in a fast moving environment as part of a small dedicated team.

Key Responsibilities: 

As a charity, you will be working within a challenging operating budget to assist STEM Wana Trust to create a series of inclusive and exciting events. 

This role requires someone with awesome customer service, organisational and time management skills, who is also innovative, creative and passionate about delivering exceptional event experiences.  You might have another skill that we’ve never thought of either – we want to hear from you!

Along with the above you will:

Connect and liaise with schools and kura, teachers and students, content providers, and stakeholders.

Assist with sourcing, finding, and coordinating other crew and volunteers and suppliers.

Working as part of a team to ensure our events are delivered to the highest standard and resolve any problems that might occur on the day or after the fact.

Skills and Qualifications:

Personal qualities: great people skills, being systematic, organised, and being highly motivated to succeed count for more than formal qualifications in this job.

Be able to maintain a pro-active attitude toward and participate in, te reo and tikanga Māori.

Demonstrate some event organising experience.

A sound knowledge of using Google shared drives and collaborative working.

Good standard communication skills (both written and oral) and experience in assisting with producing documents to different target audiences, e.g. press releases, funding applications and reports.

Candidates must have the right to work in New Zealand.

A full drivers licence is required.

Other skills helpful for this role, but not essential:

Direct email marketing and social media experience.

An understanding of the NZ STEM education and engagement landscape – to assist in the development of programmes for our events.

What’s in it for the right candidate:

You will be directly involved in helping to shape and grow STEM Wana Trust’s community profile. You will enjoy some autonomy and the freedom to create, innovate and deliver solutions that will benefit the region. You will work closely alongside a Project Manager to take STEM Wana events to yet another level! You will have the support of a small team including a Project Manager and Creative Director as well as an engaged Board of Trustees and a loyal STEM community, including sponsors and stakeholders.

This position has some flexibility around hours and days worked however, there is a requirement to be involved for several days around dates for any key events, which will include weekends and out of office hours.  

Once established there will be opportunities to work from home some days.


Contract Rate and Obligations

Fixed term contract. The contract will commence on 1st May 2022 and runs through to 30th April 2023.

To keep our team safe, STEM Wana Trust requires everyone joining our team to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19.

Please submit a covering letter outlining why you would be right for this role and attach a CV to hello@swt.nz.

Closing date: 20th March 2022. Interviews will be held during week of 21-29 March 2022.