Five Students, Five Different Strengths

The people behind Team New Zealand at the Economics Olympiad International Final Round 2026

The Economics Olympiad International Final Round is, first and foremost, an academic competition.

For Team New Zealand, the 2026 International Final in Ancient Olympia concluded with an excellent result: four medals from a five-student delegation, including two silver medals and two bronze medals.

The 2026 New Zealand Delegation was:

• Joshua Muniu Wang — Rangitoto College — Silver Medal

• Jonathan Hu — Auckland Grammar School — Silver Medal

• Aarush Kumar — Auckland Grammar School — Bronze Medal

• Josh Li — Kristin School — Bronze Medal

• Oliver Jacob Brendon Jull — New Plymouth Boys' High School

Those results are an important part of what the students accomplished in Greece. They reflect the academic preparation, knowledge and performance required to compete successfully at an International Final.

But spending six days travelling, competing and living together also revealed something that a result sheet cannot fully capture.

It showed how each student responded to pressure, responsibility, unfamiliar surroundings, new people, success and disappointment.

The five members of Team New Zealand arrived with different personalities and different ways of contributing to a group. What became increasingly clear over the course of the week was that the strength of the delegation did not come from five students being alike.

It came from what each of them brought to the team.

Joshua Muniu Wang — Bringing people together

Rangitoto College

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Joshua brought energy, openness and a natural instinct for connection.

Whenever there was free time between examinations and official activities, he was often the person looking for someone to play football with, suggesting an activity or simply starting a conversation.

That openness extended beyond Team New Zealand. One of the distinctive opportunities of an International Final is meeting students who have travelled from very different countries and educational systems, and Joshua embraced that part of the experience readily.

He was often the person who turned free time into an opportunity for connection.

For a delegation adjusting to a new country, a demanding programme and a nine-hour time difference from New Zealand, that social energy mattered. It helped create a sense that the students were not simply attending the same competition, but experiencing it together.

Jonathan Hu — Composure and academic focus

Auckland Grammar School

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Jonathan brought calmness, intellectual seriousness and quiet confidence to the delegation.

Across examinations, academic challenges, travel and official activities, he remained notably composed and focused.

Jonathan did not need to be the loudest person in the group to make his presence felt. He approached the competition thoughtfully, interacted naturally with students around him and was consistently attentive to what was expected of him as a member of the New Zealand delegation.

Even when plans changed or the programme became demanding, his response was characteristically steady.

In a busy international competition environment, that kind of composure gave the team something important: stability.

Aarush Kumar — Reliability in the details

Auckland Grammar School

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Aarush stood out for his conscientiousness, punctuality and self-discipline.

The International Final followed a tightly organised programme. Examinations, meals, academic activities, official photographs and delegation commitments all required students to manage their own time and responsibilities in an unfamiliar environment.

Again and again, Aarush was someone the delegation could rely on.

He was prepared. He was on time. He paid attention to what was expected of him.

Those qualities can sound simple, but over several intensive days on the other side of the world, they matter enormously.

Reliability is not only about being punctual. It reflects respect for a shared responsibility — recognising that being part of a national delegation means other people should be able to depend on you.

Aarush demonstrated that consistently throughout the week.

Josh Li — Thinking about the team

Kristin School

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Josh brought a strong sense of consideration for the group.

Throughout the International Final, he showed an awareness that representing New Zealand was not simply about his own examinations or individual experience. There were four other students alongside him, and he approached the week as part of a delegation rather than only as an individual competitor.

That team-mindedness often appeared in small moments: staying connected with the group, paying attention to others and sharing genuinely in his teammates' experiences.

It became especially visible at the Awards Ceremony.

When a teammate's name was announced, the response from the New Zealand students was rarely restrained. There were cheers, high-fives and embraces — moments in which one student's achievement quickly became something the group celebrated together.

Josh's instinct to think beyond himself was part of what helped five individual competitors become a team.

Oliver Jacob Brendon Jull — Commitment, curiosity and consistency

New Plymouth Boys' High School

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Oliver's contribution to Team New Zealand was perhaps best described by one word: commitment.

That commitment had been evident well before Greece. To participate in the New Zealand National Final Round, Oliver travelled from New Plymouth to Massey University in Auckland and returned home the same day, giving up his own school ball in order to compete.

When the delegation reunited in Athens months later, Oliver was already waiting well ahead of the agreed meeting time and quickly settled into the group.

On the four-hour coach journey from Athens to Ancient Olympia, he spent much of the trip in conversation with another international competitor. They talked about the International Final, the areas of economics that interested them, their wider interests and life in their respective hometowns.

It was a small moment, but one that reflected both intellectual curiosity and an openness to learning from the people around him.

That same consistency remained visible at the end of the competition. By the Awards Ceremony, Oliver knew that he would not be receiving an individual medal. Yet he arrived in formal Team New Zealand attire, stood with his teammates and celebrated their achievements with the same professionalism he had shown throughout the week.

His commitment to the delegation did not depend on personal recognition.

That kind of consistency is difficult to represent on a score sheet, but it says something important about reliability: showing up with the same standard of commitment whether or not the moment belongs to you.

Five individuals. One delegation.

Academic achievement remained at the centre of the International Final.

Three written examinations — Microeconomics, Macroeconomics and Financial Literacy — together with the Economics Policy Challenge tested the students' knowledge, analytical thinking and ability to perform under pressure.

For four members of Team New Zealand, that work ultimately resulted in international medals.

Those medals matter, and they deserve to be celebrated.

At the same time, an International Final offers something unusual: the opportunity to see young people outside the familiar environments of their schools, homes and everyday routines.

Over the course of the week, Team New Zealand travelled together, sat examinations together, ate together, met students from around the world and experienced pressure, uncertainty and celebration together.

And each student contributed something different.

Joshua brought energy and connection.

Jonathan brought composure and academic focus.

Aarush brought discipline and reliability.

Josh brought consideration for the group.

Oliver brought curiosity, consistency and deep commitment.

None of those strengths needed to look the same.

Together, those differences became a strength.

By the end of the week, they were not simply five students competing under the same flag.

They had learnt when to give one another space, when to support one another, and when to celebrate one another.

Perhaps nowhere was that more visible than at the Awards Ceremony.

When one member of the delegation succeeded, the others celebrated with him. And the same spirit extended beyond national boundaries: throughout the hall, students stood, applauded and cheered for friends they had made from other delegations only days earlier.

That combination of competition and camaraderie is part of what makes an International Olympiad distinctive.

The students came to Ancient Olympia to test themselves against some of the strongest young economics students from around the world.

They left with two silver medals, two bronze medals, new international friendships and a much clearer understanding of what it means to represent New Zealand as part of a team.

The medals record an important academic achievement.

The days surrounding them revealed the people who achieved it.

And somewhere between the long journey to Greece, the examinations, the conversations, the football games, the formal occasions and the celebrations, five individual competitors had become Team New Zealand.