UH Hilo Chancellor's Blog Posts

Summertime at the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo is vacation time for some, but also a time of academic and social enrichment for many students and prospective students.

This summer, UH Hilo hosted Upward Bound programs wherein young people took steps to follow their educational potential. We had PIPES and Akamai interns on our campus and in our community, and we welcomed Nalukai Academy that offers intensive leadership and entrepreneurship programs for high school students. We also organized the annual symposium for the Islands of Opportunity Alliance where university and college students from Hawaiʻi and the Pacific region showcased their research projects.

Upward Bound is a year-round program with services and activities to assist high school students pursue their educational and career goals. Upward Bound Summer Academy is a six-week program where students are welcomed to stay in a university residence hall and take classes that count as credit for their upcoming school year. This year’s class was treated to one of our geology courses, allowing them to learn about the unique geologic features of the island on which we live. There are also recreational activities, sports, workout sessions, and games, all in the spirit of providing a supportive foundation upon which students can thrive academically, socially, financially, and emotionally to ensure success in college and their future careers.

The Pacific Internship Programs for Exploring Science or PIPES is a summer program that supports ʻāina-based internships in our local communities and island environments with the goal to grow the next generation of leaders in Hawaiʻi and the Pacific. PIPES offers four program pathways — ancestral, ecological, community, and research — each focusing on internships and mentorships that help students track into careers that improve the quality of life for themselves, their ‘ohana, and their communities. Many alumni of this program work with state and federal agencies charged with environmental stewardship, jobs for which they are well prepared.

The Akamai Internship Program, led by the Institute for Scientist and Engineer Educators at University of California Observatories in partnership with UH Hilo, is an eight-week summer program for Hawaiʻi university and college students who want hands-on work experience at an observatory, company, or scientific facility in Hawai‘i. In addressing specific workforce needs that come with Hawai‘i observatories, the program has a community of mentors who collaborate with Akamai staff in support of students from a wide range of STEM majors (science, technology, engineering, and math). Participants presented their work publicly in a series of forums in Hilo, Waimea, on Maui, and in California.

The Nalukai Academy Summer Startup Camp was held at UH Hilo in July. Nalukai’s programs offer Hawaiʻi high school students training in social, cultural, and commercial entrepreneurship. The summer startup camp is a 10-day program where students receive mentorship from industry experts, educators, and cultural practitioners to conceptualize and pitch ventures of their own creation. During the process, participants learn about leadership, networking, and the entrepreneurial drive it takes to address the challenges of Hawaiʻi communities. I was honored to hear the final products of teams which were universally creative, socially conscious, and well considered.

Also in July, more than two dozen university students from Hawaiʻi and the Pacific region took part in an international STEM symposium organized by UH Hilo. The students and participants — who hailed from American Samoa, Guam, the Federated States of Micronesia, Hawaiʻi, the Marshall Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, and Palau — spent three days near Kīlauea volcano presenting their independent research projects, taking huakaʻi (journeys), and doing independent self-guided pilina (connection)-building activities.

This annual symposium is an event of the Islands of Opportunity Alliance, which is administered by UH Hilo and supported by the National Science Foundation through the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation program that has a mission to increase underrepresented populations in the STEM fields.

The grant supporting the alliance has just been renewed at $2.5 million for the next five years. I’m grateful that the NSF recognizes the value of the program with another grant cycle. The network we have built around STEM across the Pacific and the opportunities the program gives to students is an important component of improving all of our island communities.

With aloha,

Bonnie D. Irwin
Chancellor, UH Hilo

Aloha kākou,

Welcome to the fall semester! Those of you who participated in the Fall New Student Convocation have already felt the excitement in the air as we have more activity on campus. It was such a joy to welcome new members of our ʻohana!

Mahalo

Mahalo to those of you who were able to come out for the campus clean-up mālama ʻāina event coordinated by our new Director of Native Hawaiian Engagement Pele Harmon on August 15. I regret that I was at the Regents meeting on Maui that day, but I have heard about the enthusiasm and camaraderie of the day. Just as we care for our students and colleagues, we care for this place. Also here to welcome our new and returning students is the campus dining center lanai, which promises to be a popular gathering place on campus this fall.

Mahalo also to those of you involved in writing grants, supporting grants, and doing the work that earns us grant money. As I mentioned in July, we had our highest grant year since 2015 this past year ($22,597,700 — a 27% increase over last year), and also had an all-time high as far back as we have foundation records for gifts ($8,316,760 — a 9% increase over last year).

WSCUC (i.e. WASC)

In June, our hard-working accreditation liaison officer Seri Luangphinith and I traveled to Oakland, CA, to meet with the WSCUC Commission. We had a good conversation with commissioners and they delivered their Action Letter in July. It has been posted on our WSCUC webpage.

The Commission rightly commended the campus for the great progress we have made in program review and program assessment. My sincere thanks to all of you who have embraced that work and recognized its importance, not just for WSCUC, but for the sake of continuously improving our programs for the benefit of our students.

Because work on the strategic plan has not been completed and because we did not yet have an enrollment plan, the Commission has decided to schedule another visit in Spring 2025. The visit will take place the last week of April. By that time, they wish to see the harmonized strategic plan, a strategic enrollment plan, and more information about multi-year financial planning.

Strategic Plan

Throughout the summer, our strategic plan harmonization team — Keiki Kawaiʻaeʻa, Karen Pellegrin, Kalei Rapoza — have been working on this project. Fresh vision and mission statements and a statement of purpose and values have been developed, and the actions from the three campus plans are being consolidated into a single plan which will be available for campus comment at the end of next week. Once the campus has vetted it, we will also circulate this new plan to external communities and stakeholders, with the goal still to have it approved by our governance groups and posted by the first of the year.

Enrollment Management

Echo Delta, our enrollment management consultants, were on campus at the beginning of August and are reviewing our enrollment and student success data. The conversations were rich, challenging questions were asked, and the team is eager to help us improve both our recruitment and retention. They are confident that they can have a plan for us before the WSCUC visit this spring.VCSA Chris Holland is on point for this project and will have updates along the way.

Multi-Year Financial Plan

Each year the UH System does a high-level multi-year financial forecast. Using that as a model, we will be producing one for the campus, based on similar assumptions. VCA Rapoza also has meetings scheduled with the Faculty Congress budget committee and will be meeting with colleges to discuss budgets as well, in the hopes of raising the level of knowledge and engagement of the campus with the budgeting process.

Institutional Research

While not included in the scope of the next visit, WSCUC recommends we continue working on strengthening the data-informed culture of the campus. To that end, Jennifer Stotter and I have re-engaged with the Student Success Equity Initiative (SSEI) of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU), to which we belong. Working with AASCU and some partners with whom they work, we will be doing a landscape analysis of the student journey (Where are the obstacles? What can we improve?), working to capture the student voice through focus groups, conducting a climate study of the campus, and doing a curriculum mapping project, among other things. The team from AASCU will be on campus in mid-October.

Communication

We are always seeking ways to improve communication for both internal and external audiences. You will be seeing a new communication from University Relations coming out soon. Interim Director Amy Kalili and the UR team have been working through the summer on the purpose and design of this new communication, which will be coming out every two weeks. Look for the first issue to include updates on many things, including Kaʻi i ka Wēkiu activities. Susie Enright has also revived Keaohou, which contains research profiles of several of our faculty.

It has been a busy summer here on campus, and I am thrilled to see the students back and the campus back in action.

I mua!

Bonnie