We’re very excited to announce the appointment of Tarena Ranui to oversee our Football program at HGHS.

Tarena, a former New Zealand age group representative and US college athlete, holds an OFC/NZ Football C licence and is currently Head of Women’s Football at Melville United Academy and a teacher at Ngāruawāhia High School.

In 2019 Tarena was named McDonald’s NZ Junior Coach of the Year and was selected for New Zealand Football's expanded 2021 Female Coach Mentorship Program, which aims to address the limited number of women pursuing advanced qualifications and careers in high performance coaching. She is also part of a new national coach development initiative – Te Hāpaitanga – specifically designed to grow the talent pool of emerging and future female high-performance coaches.

Tarena describes herself as a holistic, values-based coach “I try to grow the whole person, not just the football part and I look to develop a culture people want to be part of. I've experienced the game at all levels as a girl, a teen, a scholarship athlete, age-group representative and more lately as a mother, a wife and a masters player, so I'm confident with the female space."

An HGHS alumna from the 90s, she is excited to be returning to coaching at her former high school where her career began as a student, coaching her team to a NZSS Football title in 1997. She is committed to designing an environment at HGHS where every student who would like to participate in school football has the opportunity to do so, regardless of their experience, age or ability. 

Welcome Tarena! Nau Mai Haere Mai!