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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, January 24, 2002

Popular campus deserves to toot its horn

By Jennifer Hiller
Advertiser Education Writer

At Prince David Kawananakoa Middle School, kids are auditioning for a performance of "Charlotte's Web" — one of the few junior high drama productions in the state — while the band practices Pachabel's Canon in D and students in a computer class learn to convert movie trailers into digital video.

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Prince David Kawananakoa Middle School has a particularly large band program, with 200 of the 840 youngsters participating. The Ali'i Warriors band received acclaim last year at the Heritage Festival in Las Vegas.

Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser

chool officials say it's a typical day at Kawananakoa, where the academic offerings are wider and richer than at many middle schools.

"I'm really proud of my students," said Richard Anbe, principal at Kawananakoa for 13 years. "They're high-achieving, and that makes for proud parents who support the school. It's a nice circle."

Founded in 1927 as Fort Street School, Kawananakoa will celebrate its 75th year next fall.

The original campus was in rented quarters of the Japanese Language School. Kawananakoa has been at its current location at Nu'uanu Avenue and Pauoa Road since 1928.

About 35 percent of the students at Kawananakoa live outside of the immediate neighborhoods and come to the campus under the Department of Education's "geographic exceptions" program that allows students from outside a school's boundaries to apply to attend. There are 50 students on the waiting list — which says something about the school's academic programs, as well as the part of town the school is in.

"We have an older community," Anbe said.

Kawananakoa is the only middle school that offers three years of science as a standard part of its curriculum, and that is one reason many parents want their children to attend school there.

Students take seven classes at a time — a larger class load than at nearly all other middle schools. But it allows for the science classes and reading classes on every grade level.

"Everyone has reading, everyone has science," Anbe said. "We looked at national studies and saw how low Hawai'i was. Then we surveyed the parents and the community."

 •  At a glance

• Where: 49 Funchal St.

• Phone: 587-4430

• Principal: Richard Anbe, who grew up on a Maui plantation and believes in the idea that it takes a village to raise a child. He's been bringing that philosophy to Kawananakoa since he was a student teacher there. "When you're in a school a long time, you start to see the children of your former students," he said.

• School nickname: Ali'i Warriors

• School colors: red, gold and black

• Enrollment: 840 students. The school's maximum capacity is around 1,200, but Anbe says the school can't take more students now because its feeder elementary schools are free to choose whether or not to send their sixth-grade classes to Kawananakoa. If Anbe takes more geographic exceptions and gets a new group of sixth-graders, the school could become crowded beyond capacity.

• SATs: Here's how Kawananakoa students fared on the most recent Stanford Achievement Test. Listed are the combined percentages of students scoring average and above average, compared with the national combined average of 77 percent. Eighth-grade reading, 81 percent; math, 90 percent.

• Computers: Kawananakoa has a computer in every classroom and about 35 computers in a lab where students can learn desktop publishing, Web page design and digital video production.

Parents were especially interested in more reading classes. With the help of some grant money, the school went through a restructuring in the early 1990s to rework its class schedule and curriculum to allow for the extra coursework.

The school also has a wide range of electives. Students can choose from band or orchestra, art, computer, home economics and shop classes. The band program is particularly large; 200 of the 840 students participate.

In addition to school performances, the band marches in parades statewide, and last year was the only middle school band invited to the Heritage Festival in Las Vegas. The band received the Gold Award in its division, a Certificate of Excellence, which is awarded to the outstanding musical group in the festival, and the Adjudicators' Award, which is given to groups scoring 92 percent or higher on a national high school standard.

"The students here are really good kids," said Leonard Hasuko, band director. "It's always been easy for me to take them anywhere."

Kawananakoa has been selected as one of 30 schools scheduled for major repairs starting this spring. Classrooms will be renovated, along with some office space. Anbe is especially excited that the outside of the buildings will be painted — some of them for the first time since the 1960s.

He also hopes the school will be able to find money to remove some reliefs from an old fountain and put them in a new outdoor art display at the entrance as part of the school's 75th anniversary.

• What are you most proud of? The teachers. Anbe said his staff is enthusiastic about adding an extra class onto the day. Even though it added to the teaching load, teachers said they have wanted students to have the three years of science and reading classes to improve academic performance.

"You have to be proud of the teachers for wanting to make the change," Anbe said. "It made their teaching load much heavier. They had to agree to go for the reform and the structure."

• Best-kept secret? The seven-class schedule. Most middle schools have just six classes, but Kawananakoa has a rotating schedule that allows for a six-period day, with seven classes throughout the week.

"We try to tell other schools the seven-period schedule works," Anbe said. "It gives them the opportunity to do the reading, science and electives."

• Everyone at school knows? Principal Anbe, who has been there nearly his entire career. Anbe taught at Kawananakoa while attending the University of Hawai'i-Manoa, spent 17 years as a counselor there and has been principal for the past 13 years.

"My entire career started here and will probably end here, too," Anbe said. Other longtime teachers include Anthony Andrade, the seventh-grade P.E. teacher, and Donna Hultstrom, an English teacher.

• What we need: A renovation of the auditorium, which is named after Princess Abigail Kawananakoa and was built in 1937 after she persuaded the Territorial Legislature to appropriate the money for it.

Princess Abigail used to come to the school and give speeches outside the auditorium under the monkeypod tree.

The large auditorium can seat the entire school (as long as the sixth-graders sit on the floor in front), but school officials worry about letting community groups use the space because of repair and safety problems.

• Special events: The school celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. Events such as a march and the burial of a time capsule during the fall semester will commemorate the anniversary.