Holbrook High School alumna and 2006 valedictorian, Lehyla Heward, graduated with a Doctorate of Philosophy from Victoria University of Wellington Te Herenga Waka (VUW) in Wellington, New Zealand, on May 4. Lehyla’s doctoral thesis focused on Chinese and Korean intellectual history in Northeast China during one of the region’s most harrowing periods. From 1931 to 1945, the Japanese empire occupied Northeast China and created a nation that encompassed the region called Manchukuo. Lehyla’s dissertation contributes to the understanding of the literature and history of non-Japanese communities in Manchukuo. Lehyla studied Chinese at Northeast Normal University in Changchun, China (the former capital of Manchukuo). She received a Master of Arts there in 2015. She is currently working on a collaboration to create a series of Chinese immersion programs in Taiwan. Lehyla is the daughter of Bryan and Alysia Heward of Woodruff and Alana and Richard Evans of Moore, Okla. VUW is proud to be New Zealand’s number one ranked university for research and offers over 30 undergraduate and over 140 postgraduate programs.
