Parent Advocacy Results in New Kaiapuni Class at Kapolei

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More students are graduating from kula kaiapuni Hawaiʻi (Hawaiian language immersion schools) and taking their language skills and Hawaiian worldviews into higher education and their careers. This is both an incredible achievement and a growing challenge for Hawaiʻiʻs public school system, which struggles to meet the demand for kaiapuni.

“Our kaiapuni graduates are making a difference here in Hawaiʻi and across the globe, nationally and internationally,” said Keith Hayashi, Hawaiʻi State Department of Education (HIDOE) superintendent. “We all should be proud of them, doing what they’re doing, making a commitment to making a difference. And at the same time, sometimes selfishly speaking, I want to tell them to stay home and be a teacher because we need you.”

The first kula kaiapuni within HIDOE opened in 1987 with two pilot kindergarten classes—one at Waiau Elementary in Pearl City, Oʻahu, and the other at Keaukaha Elementary in Hilo on Hawaiʻi Island. These programs built upon the pioneering efforts of the Pūnana Leo preschools, which first opened in 1984 to revitalize ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi through full language immersion.

The HIDOE Office of Hawaiian Education (OHE) Director Kauʻi Sang, a former classroom teacher, stated, “Early on in kaiapuni’s existence, the teachers came out of the homes. They were the parents of the students.”

Since then, the HIDOE has faced incredible demand for more.

“When we first started, everything was rapid and there was no way to catch up with the materials and so we’ve always been building the plane and flying it at the same time,” said Sang. “I think we’re just trying to look for the point in time when we can see how we start to stabilize the system to make sure that we can also ensure quality and meet the demand at the same time.”

Over the last 10 years, the HIDOE has added 12 more kaiapuni sites – increasing from 14 to 26 – with enrollment rising 60%, from 1,552 to 2,607 students.

The 2025-2026 school year welcomed the expansion of a kaiapuni ninth grade level at Kapolei High School after Ke ʻAlohi ʻo ʻEwa (KAʻE) advocated for growth in the ʻEwa district. The group took to social media to solicit a kumu. In July, Kapolei High School announced it had secured a ninth-grade teacher and began seeking interested students. KAʻE also spread the word.

Andrea Dias-Machado is the president of KAʻE and part of the latest generation of parents pushing for kaiapuni expansion and the larger gain of ʻolelo Hawaiʻi in communities.

“Kaiapuni education is here because of mākua (parents). Mākua are the direct driving force of kaiapuni education,” said Dias-Machado. “So we think about the ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, the mamas and the papas of the ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi movement, you know, them going door to door, canvassing communities, asking ʻohana to take this risk. And, you know, we stand on their shoulders.”

KAʻE emerged from six parents whose children attended Kula Kaiapuni ʻo Waiau. Together they mobilized their networks to learn what happened after students advanced beyond elementary. They discovered that many kaiapuni K-6 students did not continue immersion education due to the lack of resources in their home communities.

Currently, HIDOE has only one K-12 kaiapuni school on Oʻahu – Ānuenue in Pālolo. Ke Kula ʻo Samuel M. Kamakau, a K-12 public charter school in Kāneʻohe, serves Windward Oʻahu. In addition, four HIDOE high schools offer kaiapuni: Castle, Kailua, Kahuku, and now Kapolei. According to the Ke ʻAlohi ʻo ʻEwa Strategic Vision Report, 42% of Ānuenue students reside in the ʻEwa and Waiʻanae districts. KAʻE envisions a K-12 kula kaiapuni built within three years to serve not only ʻEwa, but also the leeward and central districts.

“We were thinking about how many Native Hawaiian students could be served with what has become the most densely populated Hawaiian community in Kapolei with four Hawaiian homesteads,” said Dias-Machado. “It is our kuleana to really illuminate that brilliance of our keiki through ʻōlelo Hawai’i place-based immersion education. So, we honor the moʻolelo of this place, we honor the momi (pearls) of this place, and we honor it through the advocacy of creating this organization to realize our vision of a K-12 kula kaiapuni.”

KAʻE seeks to go further. “Another goal that we have is to create a community of practice between cultural practitioners and kumu kaiapuni to create a K-12 sequence ʻEwa Moku-specific curriculum,” said Dias-Machado, noting that KAʻE reached out to the University of Hawaiʻi West Oʻahu to explore a teacher pipeline.

OHE works with the community to support kula kaiapuni through its Board of Education ʻAha Kauleo, a statewide advisory council of parents, teachers, and administrators from kaiapuni schools.

“We can have hard conversations with our community partners through the department-hosted quarterly ʻAha Kauleo meetings,” said Sang. “I think it’s the best chance for us from a systems-wide perspective and a systems-thinking perspective to be able to try and negotiate how much and where – to have the right kinds of conversations.”

These conversations include the complex needs HIDOE must address when opening new kaiapuni programs. The department faces a difficult balance between quality and quantity. Despite strong support from the legislature and state policy, teacher shortages remain a pressing issue, with 20 current vacancies despite incentives and recruitment strategies aimed at building the pool of proficient candidates.

KAʻE is ramping up its advocacy efforts for the upcoming legislative session and plans to work with HIDOE and other kaiapuni partners to expand educational resources for Hawaiian language immersion.

Sang noted that there has been legislative support and, as more programs embrace Hawaiian language, she remains hopeful.

“It definitely indicates that there is a desire for all of us to move in that direction. That increases value for ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi and that starts to validate that we are a two-language state,” said Sang.