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The Honolulu Advertiser

Posted on: Thursday, March 15, 2001


Campus mood is sympathetic

 •  Hawai'i teachers OK strike overwhelmingly
 •  Impact of strike to be widespread
 •  Teachers' contract dispute at a glance

By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer

If parents and students at Honolulu's historic Royal School are any indication, Hawai'i's teachers have support in their bid for higher wages, even if education and child care for thousands of families would be disrupted by a strike.

Loren Yoshimura picks up sons Vance, 10, and Kainoa, 8, after classes at Royal School. Teachers need the money they're asking for, said Yoshimura, a state employee who lives in Waipahu.

Bruce Asato • The The Honolulu Advertiser

But there are those with other concerns in this close-knit campus community as well.

"Could they wait until after the Disneyland trip?" asked fourth- grader Alexander DeGuzman, 10, a member of the school's famous bell choir, which has been feverishly raising money for a March 25 excursion to California.

Alexander's trip appears to be safe. The strike authorized overwhelmingly in a teachers' vote last night would not take place before April 5, and then only if negotiations between now and then fail.

Some parents picking up students after school yesterday said teachers have earned a raise.

"They need the money," said Loren Yoshimura of Waipahu, on a lunch break from his job as a state equipment operator to pick up sons Vance, 10, and Kainoa, 8.

"I'm fortunate to have my mother-in-law living with us, so she can take care of the boys if there is a strike, but I would support the teachers anyway," Yoshimura said.

A little way up Nu'uanu Valley, at the private Hongwanji Mission School, principal Lois Yasui said her school will be one of the private institutions that can take in a few students if the strike comes.

"We haven't had any requests as far as even inquiries, and I think primarily the public is hoping for the best," Yasui said.

"In the past, I know, parents have kept their children at home during a strike. Parents have taken off from work, or made other emergency caregiving arrangements," she said.

"That will work if it is a short strike, but if it is prolonged ..."

On the Windward side, Kama'aina Kids said it was preparing to augment its privately operated before- and after-school programs for school-age children to accommodate some during school hours if there is a strike.

At Royal School, parent Curtis Peden III was ready for the worst. "I support the strike,' said Peden, a teleconferencing coordinator for Genesis Conferencing, who was picking up Curtis IV, 9, and daughter Keisha, 10.

"Hawai'i's teachers are underpaid and overworked, classrooms are too crowded, and teachers often buy supplies out of their own pockets," Peden said. "And they do a wonderful job. You've got to compare them to the Mainland. Mainland teachers don't have as much aloha, as we say, or as much compassion for the kids, which makes the whole difference."

Rodalgo Agsalud and Lunita Magbulos sat on a wall chatting while they waited for their respective grandchildren, Christine Agonoy, 8, and Garric Culenay, 8. "I would be taking care of her if there were a strike," Magbulos said of her granddaughter, "and I don't mind that."

Sue Olive of Nu'uanu, a homemaker picking up daughters Maria, 8, and Sunny, 7, hadn't heard of the strike threat, but said many parents would end up caring for their children if school shut down. Did she think there would be a strike? "I hope not," she said.

Lovely Kwock was controlling traffic as the children scampered off the campus or stopped to show her a favorite drawing. "Bye, Alice! Bye-bye, Lee-Anne!" she said as she waved to students passing by.

She wondered what she would do with her days as an auntie to 400 students if the school shut down. "I am a parent facilitator - that's what I am, an adult supervisor. I would have no job. But if they want the raise, I guess they go on strike."

Opinions among the young students were mixed.

Yoshimura's son Vance said he would feel "kind of sad" if there were a strike, because "we wouldn't be able to come to school and stuff."

Peden's daughter Keisha, a fifth-grader, said: "The teachers shouldn't go on strike, because it affects so many things, like SATs."

Fifth-grader Jayleen Ichokwan, 11, said: "I care because if they are without teachers, where are the doctors and the lawyers going to come from?"

Keoni Yount, 9, said a strike would mean "summer vacation comes early," but worried about whether he'd be able to complete the fourth grade if teaching were interrupted for a long time.

Principal Sandra Ishihara-Shibata said rules at Royal School require a student to attend at least 21 days in a 45-day quarter to receive a grade for that duration.

She said she was still not sure whether Royal would be kept open despite the strike, under a plan to deal with the situation campus-by-campus.

The principal thumbed through an inch-thick contingency folder being circulated to the schools, and said she didn't want a strike to occur, "but I think it will happen."

"Emotions are running pretty high among the teachers," Ishihara-Shibata said.

"We'll be fine no matter what happens," she said, glancing around her office. "I don't know about the kids, though."