Today we visited the Kamehameha Schools. The K-12 schools serve almost 2,500 native Hawaiian students. Only native or part native students are allowed to attend the school and it is an incredibly well endowed and successful school. Because it is so successful it has found its preferential admissions policy under attack from a number of sources.
The campus was beautiful and it was fascinating to get to meet and talk to the teachers at the school. I have to admit to knowing nothing about Hawaiian history. If pressed, I might be able to come up with the decade that Hawaiian became a state, but that is about all. I learned today that the U annexed Hawai'i illegally (through a joint resolution of Congress, rather than a treaty as required by our constitution) and, according to the international courts at the Hague, is illegally occupying the islands of Hawai'i. Umi, a Hawaiian member of our group going to New Zealand, is involved in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement. When talking to him, I find my ignorance embarrassing.
Here Juan Carlos and I pose at Kamehameha Schools. Check out the view!
The group I am traveling with is amazingly diverse, intelligent, and well-traveled. We are 13 women and 3 men. 14 of us are teachers and 2 are librarians. The teachers cover all grade levels and teach history, English, ESL, German, and Japanese. We seem to be divided between people within 5 years of my age and people in their 50s. Being chosen to take part in the program is incredibly humbling and moving--the legacy of Senator Fulbright is not only a prestigious one, but also a moving tribute to world peace. He firmly believed that it is only through meeting people from other cultures that the people of the world will work to live in peace.
He said about the Fulbright Program: "Fostering these--leadership, learning, and empathy between cultures--was and remains the purpose of the international scholarship program...it is a modest program with an immodest aim--the achievement in international affairs of a regime more civilized, rational and humane than the empty system of power of the past."
The campus was beautiful and it was fascinating to get to meet and talk to the teachers at the school. I have to admit to knowing nothing about Hawaiian history. If pressed, I might be able to come up with the decade that Hawaiian became a state, but that is about all. I learned today that the U annexed Hawai'i illegally (through a joint resolution of Congress, rather than a treaty as required by our constitution) and, according to the international courts at the Hague, is illegally occupying the islands of Hawai'i. Umi, a Hawaiian member of our group going to New Zealand, is involved in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement. When talking to him, I find my ignorance embarrassing.
Here Juan Carlos and I pose at Kamehameha Schools. Check out the view!
The group I am traveling with is amazingly diverse, intelligent, and well-traveled. We are 13 women and 3 men. 14 of us are teachers and 2 are librarians. The teachers cover all grade levels and teach history, English, ESL, German, and Japanese. We seem to be divided between people within 5 years of my age and people in their 50s. Being chosen to take part in the program is incredibly humbling and moving--the legacy of Senator Fulbright is not only a prestigious one, but also a moving tribute to world peace. He firmly believed that it is only through meeting people from other cultures that the people of the world will work to live in peace.
He said about the Fulbright Program: "Fostering these--leadership, learning, and empathy between cultures--was and remains the purpose of the international scholarship program...it is a modest program with an immodest aim--the achievement in international affairs of a regime more civilized, rational and humane than the empty system of power of the past."
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