OUR SCHOOLS • HANALEI ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
Campus' small student body is big on reading

By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Kaua'i Bureau

HANALEI, Kaua'i — Hanalei Elementary School is shrinking dramatically, having lost nearly a third of its enrollment in the past seven years, but despite doubled-up classes, scholarship is good, said principal Nathan Aiwohi.

The images on Hanalei Elementary's sculpture, "Stories of Hanalei," represent tales about the region. While the sculpture's shape hints at a favorite pastime of the students, principal Nathan Aiwohi said children are not allowed to bring surfboards to campus. Jan TenBruggencate • The Honolulu Advertiser

An active community helps alleviate some of the problems that doubled-up classes may cause, he said. One of the real strengths is reading, in which the school has far surpassed basic requirements on standardized tests.

"We did really well because the basic reading program is pretty good, but more importantly, we have a parent community that really appreciates and supports literacy in the home, and we have a bunch of people who come in and tutor," he said.

Barbara Robeson, chairwoman of the school's School Community Based Management program, said Hanalei parents and community members feel it's a responsibility to remain involved with the school, even after their own kids have long since left the classroom, as Robeson's son has.

"It's small. It's rural. The parents are involved, and they like keeping the kids in the community," she said. That's why many are fighting to keep the sixth grade at Hanalei Elementary, rather than having those kids taken by bus each day the 20 miles to Kapa'a Middle School, she said.

An enrichment program every Friday exposes kids to art, advanced movement physical education, and chess, which chess instructor Terence Moeller said helps provide the groundwork for analytical thinking and pattern recognition.

"I have seen kids who couldn't concentrate on anything for over a minute at a time become completely immersed in chess for an afternoon," he said.

The school sits along Kuhio Highway at the western end of Hanalei Town, backed by taro fields and flanked by the Waioli River, a couple of blocks from the beach at Hanalei Bay. The central feature in the schoolyard is a giant sculpture of a wave, titled "Stories of Hanalei."

The school buildings have wide hallways and are connected by covered walkways, and it needs them. The famed rains of Hanalei fall frequently and heavily, helping maintain the waterfall-etched green mountains and keeping taro fields and rivers flowing.

• What are you most proud of? "Hanalei Elementary has done exceedingly well in reading. We have an awesome reading program. Our students in the last Hawai'i State Assessment testing ranked pretty high," Aiwohi said.

• Best-kept secret: The backdrop of the mountains behind Hanalei is the most impressive of any school in the state, he said.

• Everybody at our school knows: Betty Steed, student services coordinator. "She needs to be aware of every student's needs. She has recess duty every day and she works year-round, so if a student has a problem during the holidays, they can contact her. She is very versatile, my second-in-command," Aiwohi said.

• What we need: "Because our school is so small, we can build a very close community of learners, and we can get to know our kids much faster than in a larger school, but that also makes it difficult to balance grade levels and classes." The school hires part-time teachers to take up the slack, some of them paid through contributions by the school's Parent Teacher Association.

• Special events: One Friday each month is "market day," at which students can spend phony cash they earn as rewards in the classroom. Teachers make sure that all students earn some. They can spend the reward money on games, treats like shave ice made with Kilauea-grown guava concentrate, and at booths set up by parents each month. The most recent market had nail painting, face painting, and basketball hoop shoots.