Ezekiel Raui was a Year 11 student at Taipā Area School when he began to make a name for himself as a passionate promoter of solutions to problems facing many of his generation.
And now his younger brother, 17-year-old Shalynd, is well on the way to to joining the ranks of Taipā's high achievers too, courtesy of a not entirely unrelated passion.
Shalynd, the son of Tunui and Vanessa Raui, was born with club feet, a deformity that he said last week was unknown in his family. He had never had surgery, he said, but his grandmother had spent many hours massaging his feet when he was small, "pretty much restructuring" the bones in his feet.
While the condition posed some problems, it does not seem to have slowed him down. His major symptom now is aching in one leg, particularly in cold weather, but he is a keen and active sportsman, specialising in basketball, touch rugby, ki-o-rahi and volleyball. And it has inspired a career dream.
Shalynd will begin his four-year degree course at AUT next year, with the aim of forging a career as physiotherapist. And he has won a major helping hand in the form of a McDonald's scholarship, worth $12,500 over four years.