Embracing Education and Contesting Americanization: A Reexamination of Native Hawaiian Student Engagement in Territorial Hawai‘i’s Public Schools, 1920–1940

This article explores the efforts of Native Hawaiian students to appropriate and take control of their schooling as part of a broad Indigenous story of empowerment during Hawai‘i’s territorial years (1900–1959). Histories of this era lack a visible Indigenous presence and contribute to the myth that Natives passively accepted the Americanization of the islands. This article challenges this myth by examining Native student writings to tell a story of Native involvement in education as a pragmatic strategy designed to advance distinctly Indigenous interests through the American education system. These stories reveal schools as complex sites of negotiation where Native students regularly navigated sociocultural pressure from their friends, parents, teachers, and America's growing presence in the islands while testing and exploring their own identities.

Lessons Learned from a Culturally Responsive Case Study

This article describes how researchers used a culturally responsive case study approach to understand how Native Hawaiian students made postsecondary decisions and the lessons they learned through this process. Unique to this study were the steps taken in gaining entry to the research site and building relationships with the gatekeepers and student participants through culturally appropriate communication styles and activities. Concerted efforts were employed prior to and during the interviews to promote culturally responsive interactions (e.g., sharing of food). Implications are discussed for individuals teaching, counseling, and researching Native Hawaiian students and their families and include strategies for building relationships to gain entry and to gain confidence of participants; investigating social context prior to entry, discussion of rituals and routines, values and priorities; and viewing participant responses with respect to their worldview.

College Pride, Native Pride: A Portrait of a Culturally Grounded Precollege Access Program for American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian Students

In this article Adrienne J. Keene employs the portraiture methodology to explore the story of College Horizons. She examines this precollege access program for American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian students to understand how a program rooted in Native cultures and identities can not only provide a space to create knowledge surrounding the college application process but also create a college-bound Native identity. The motto of the program, “College Pride, Native Pride” embodies a duality that emerges through the program itself.

Standing Behind and Listening to Native Hawaiian Students in the Transition Process

The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to describe how culture, disability, and prospective first-generation college student status influenced the transition decisions of five native Hawaiian students with specific learning disabilities who attended a Hawaiian-focused charter school. Students had strong ties to their history and culture which influenced all facets of their lives including their decisions about the future. Accessing postsecondary education (PSE) was viewed as a means to employment that would enable them to support their family members. The lack of economic, social, and cultural capital may present a larger barrier to accessing PSE than disability. Implications for personnel who are tasked with developing and maintaining culturally appropriate curricula and programs for students are discussed.