University adds Kiwi flavour to American textbook

Most New Zealand students relate more easily to Kiwi business examples such as Trade Me and Kiwi Experience than to a Boeing factory in Seattle.

That's why Victoria University has officially launched a New Zealand edition of popular American textbook Using MIS this week, for use in first-year Information Systems classes.

Tony Hooper, Senior Lecturer in Victoria's School of Information Management, was approached by publishing company Pearson to develop a localised version of the Management Information Systems (MIS) textbook. He says that much of the material available to academics teaching in New Zealand universities is sourced from other countries, but students don't always relate to overseas content.

"Many of my first-year students struggled to connect with the business references and cultural idioms of the American version of the textbook."

Pearson approached Mr Hooper about compiling the New Zealand version of the textbook in 2008, having in 2007 published a booklet of New Zealand case studies.

The New Zealand version of Using MIS is interspersed with New Zealand case studies featuring Kiwi businesses and Kiwi business personalities such as Sam Morgan, who sold Trade Me to Fairfax in 2006 for NZ$750 million.

Hundreds of hours of research and writing have gone into the work, which Mr Hooper co-authored with David Kroenke, the original US author.

The New Zealand version is now being used at both Victoria and Canterbury universities.