Posted on: Tuesday, February 11, 2003

ISLAND VOICES
A-Plus is an integral ingredient of school

By Tom Levy
Communications director for Kama'aina Kids

As Hawai'i public school officials scour for programs to cut to make up for a state budget shortfall, A-Plus is once again on the chopping block. With the ax poised overhead, debate stirs over whether the popular after-school program is instructional or mere "baby sitting."

Even influential education leaders may underestimate how A-Plus helps advance our educational goals. For example, last year, in a Honolulu Advertiser op-ed piece, state schools chief Pat Hamamoto called A-Plus "a valuable program" but said, "it's basically a childcare program and not instructional."

We at Kama'aina Kids, a statewide, private nonprofit childcare provider operating 36 A-Plus sites around the state, strongly believe our A-Plus programs are more about education and character-building than child-minding.

Since its legislatively mandated inception in 1989, Hawai'i's A-Plus system has been giving latchkey kids a safe, supervised place for sports, homework and other educational enrichment.

For starters, Kama'aina Kids' "Play with a Purpose" recreational curriculum was designed around the DOE's Hawai'i Core Content Standards, reinforcing the standards-based curriculum kids get in school. Our group leaders get 30 hours of training at the beginning of each year, with more in-service training throughout the year.

Our after-school activities complement the instruction keiki get in school. Aside from getting help with homework from trained group leaders, keiki can learn ceramics, drama, music, hula and Tahitian dance, karate and tae kwon do, computers and aquatics. In fact, with some schools cutting back on art or exercise time, A-Plus may be the only place students get exposure to such activities.

Last year keiki at our Kainalu Elementary School A-Plus site learned to ride and groom horses at "Da Ranch," a rural horse farm. And children at our Nimitz Elementary School A-Plus site sang and danced in a production of "The Wizard of Oz."

A-Plus protects and nurtures the talents of children whose only other option might be hanging out in an unhealthy street culture, going to a crowded library with shortened hours or heading to a home empty of grownups. A-Plus gives parents peace of mind that their children are safe and engaged in productive and creative activities. And ultimately, that should reassure us all.