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The former student member of the Hawaii State Board of Education says the panel suffers from the “horrible leadership” of its chairman, Garrett Toguchi.

Kelly Maeshiro, 17, sat down this month with Civil Beat to talk about his experience on the board last year and his thoughts on education before he leaves for his freshman year at Harvard University. Even though the board’s student member doesn’t get to vote, at least one voting member who served with Maeshiro says the young man is worth listening to.

“I’ve seen excellent student body representatives — believe me, really bright young people and hard workers,” said board member Donna Ikeda, who also served more than two decades in the Hawaii Legislature. “But Kelly is the only one who ever stood up against the board leadership.”

Ikeda is leaving the board after her second term expires this year due to frustration with what she characterizes as a dysfunctional board with a tyrant for a leader.

Toguchi through a spokesman declined to respond to Maeshiro’s charges. They come as voters are being asked whether they want to dump the elected board in favor of one appointed by the governor. Toguchi is opposed to the change, saying the board’s problems could be solved by providing it with more authority and autonomy.

Maeshiro, who as a high school senior represented approximately 180,000 Hawaii public school students during one of the most politically tumultuous years in the board’s history, said he still believes the board and department can improve and help schools.

“But I think the main thing is the board members could get along a little better,” he said. “It was a shock to see how childish sometimes adults could be — because that’s stuff you learned in kindergarten: Get along.”

He told Civil Beat: “I can’t really sugarcoat Toguchi’s horrible leadership.”

Maeshiro cited a number of events from the past year that he said caused confusion and division on the board.

‘So Many Tyrannies’

Ikeda, Maeshiro and three other board members protested in January the fact that Toguchi waited a week before telling them the news of former education superintendent Patricia Hamamoto’s resignation. Maeshiro also spoke out against the chairman for not telling board members in a timely manner about a tentative agreement reached with the teachers union to end Furlough Fridays.

According to the from the Jan. 7, 2010 board meeting:

“Mr. Maeshiro stated that he understands and resonates with the concerns of Ms. Ikeda. He agrees that the public has a right to know what is happening. He stated that he too had not been timely informed of the Board’s actions, including the resignation of Superintendent Hamamoto and the tentative agreement reached with HSTA. He stated that as the Board Student Member he feels obligated to remind his colleagues that the reason they are here should only be for students.”

Toguchi explained that he waited to tell board members until the resignation was certain, because Hamamoto had tried to resign twice before and he talked her out of it each time. The meeting minutes reveal displeasure among some board members that Toguchi never informed them of Hamamoto’s previous resignation attempts.

“At times he acts like he’s a one-man board,” Maeshiro told Civil Beat about Toguchi’s handling of the union agreement and the superintendent’s resignation.

Board spokesman Alex Da Silva referred Civil Beat to the minutes when asked for Toguchi’s response to Maeshiro’s charges.

The decision to challenge Toguchi was difficult, Maeshiro said, because the board holds the purse for the Hawaii State Student Council’s annual budget of $40,000. Maeshiro was elected to serve on the board by the student council. So Maeshiro’s Jan. 7 speech was a protest regarding not just Toguchi’s withholding of information, but “so many tyrannies,” he said

One of those tyrannies was the perceived punishment of board member Maggie Cox after she challenged Toguchi in the board’s on Dec. 3, 2009.

“She knew she didn’t have the votes, but she ran against him anyway, and I guess he saw that as some act of rebellion,” Maeshiro said.

At on Dec. 10, Toguchi submitted his suggestions for committee assignments. While he left most of the existing committee chairs in their places, he had removed Cox from her position as chairwoman of the Committee on Curriculum, Instruction and Student Support, board member Eileen Clarke noted in the minutes.

“Dr. Clarke is not sure what the rationale is because Ms. Cox has been working diligently and is very knowledgeable,” the minutes state. “Dr. Clarke stated that she would like to have Ms. Cox reinstated to the committee chairperson position.

The proposed amendment failed for lack of a majority, according to the minutes. But Maeshiro has not forgotten that the woman who was widely respected among board members for being the most qualified to lead the curriculum committee was stripped of her chairmanship.

Ikeda and former board member Breene Harimoto kept their own much longer lists of “egregious misdeeds,” Maeshiro told us.

Indeed, Ikeda, Cox and Clarke chided Toguchi again in July for unilaterally firing the board’s executive director without consulting board members. She read aloud an e-mail from Toguchi to board members explaining the decision. The e-mail cited , which he said vests such authority in him, but Ikeda took exception with the chairman’s interpretation of his interpretation of the bylaw.

Toguchi’s leadership sets a tone of pettiness and childishness among board members that at times makes it difficult to conduct business and to focus on what really matters, which is education, Maeshiro said. Individually, he said each of the members seems committed to the board’s mission of improving education. Collectively, under Toguchi’s leadership, it seems many can lose sight of that mission due to internal politics.

And the chairman’s retaliation against Cox may intimidate other board members from seeking leadership positions because, “to Toguchi, it will be viewed as rebellion if you run against him.”