Fed-up pupils launch campaign to add seating
By Eloise Aguiar
Advertiser Windward O'ahu Writer
Photos by Gregory Yamamoto • The Honolulu Advertiser
KANE'OHE — Almost every day, about half of the 1,800 students at Castle High School have to find a place to eat their lunch because the cafeteria seats only 450 people.
From left: Castle High School seniors Tatiana Lakalo, 17, Sachelle Featheran, 18, and Juliana Sanders, 17, eat their lunch near the school's main hallway because of limited seating in the cafeteria.
Even though meals are served in two shifts, hundreds of students must search for a shady, semicomfortable — and hopefully clean — place to have lunch.
Luckier students snag the few benches available on campus or head back to a classroom, but many sit on walls and hallway floors, disposable trays in hand.
Outside the cafeteria, dozens congregate around a shaded courtyard that students say is a mudhole when it rains and a source of dirt that blows into their faces and food when it's dry.
Fed up with the situation that has persisted for years, some students have decided to launch a campaign that is part public relations, part fund-raiser in hopes of renovating the courtyard and adding tables and seating for 200 students. And doing it all by next fall.
"Sometimes they get impatient with us adults," said Meredith Maeda, school principal. "They just wanted to say, OK, let's do it. It's a student initiative."
The school's Ultimate Site Committee — made up of community residents, faculty and students — planned the courtyard solution to the cafeteria seating problem two years ago but were told the project couldn't proceed until other work was completed.
Students on the committee grew tired of waiting and want to raise the $60,000 needed for everything from grading the site to tables and benches and landscaping.
So they're planning car washes and games at Windward Mall to make the community aware of the project and to raise money. A display at the mall will include the plans for the benches, as well as students' art, science and history projects.
At Castle High, meals are usually served in two shifts in the crowded cafeteria. About half of the student body must find a campus spot to have lunch.
Castle High School students find spots on campus to eat lunch because of a lack of cafeteria seating. Fed up with the situation, students are planning to raise the $60,000 needed for more sitting areas.
Chelsea Maeda, a Castle junior and a member of the committee for two years, said there was always talk about how quickly the work could be completed but not much was being done to raise money for the project.
When the school opened in 1951, it was made up of classroom buildings and the cafeteria. There was no administration building and no gym, said Hank Iida, a 1953 Castle graduate and member of the school's alumni association. At the time, the campus was only a temporary location for the high school, Iida said, adding that King Intermediate was to be the high school but minds were changed.
"It was a small school," he said, but it was adequate for the 400 to 500 students at the time. But not anymore.
Iida said he was glad to see the students taking the initiative to improve their campus.
The plan calls for grading the 36-by-86-foot courtyard and taking out the low spots so water can drain off. A walkway will be added across the courtyard and interlocking bricks will form foundations for the tables and benches. A wall will be built around the shade trees to provide more sitting area. Lawn and ground cover will be planted.
Car wash Castle Day at Windward Mall
The project will add about 200 seats for students, said Regina Yoshimori, student activities coordinator and committee member.
FUND-RAISERS
Games for children, displays
Chelsea Maeda spearheaded the idea for the fund-raisers.
"We've been writing for grants, but we've been denied," Yoshimori said. "So we decided to start and hope we get donations from the community."
Reach Eloise Aguiar at eaguiar@honoluluadvertiser.com or 234-5266.
