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What do Gov. Neil Abercrombie‘s nine Hawaii State Board of Education appointees say about education?

Our new topic pages on the nominees should help you find some answers.

We’ve put together brief biographies and gathered each nominee’s Senate testimony as well as answers to questions from Civil Beat.

We’ve formally asked Abercrombie’s office for copies of the applications of each of the nominees, but press secretary Donalyn Dela Cruz told us she does not plan to fulfill the request until after the appointees are confirmed.

The full Senate is expected to vote on the appointees this Thursday. Pending confirmation, the new board’s first meeting is scheduled for April 26.

What They Have In Common

It’s clear that these appointees come from diverse backgrounds. Many are public school graduates or have children in Hawaii’s public schools. Their collective experience covers a number of industries in the the full range of sectors: public, private and nonprofit. Still, they share several common goals:

• Changing the culture in the Department of Education to develop strategic longterm goals
• Staying out of the superintendent’s day-to-day business
• Supporting the superintendent in Hawaii’s Race to the Top effort
• Including the governor in strategizing

One-Liners

Here are some teasers, excerpts from each of their pages:

Don Horner:

I can tell you one thing we’re not going to do is compare ourselves to previous boards.

Kim Gennaula

This new board will be transparent in all it does, motivated to make change happen as quickly and positively as possible, and hold the Superintendent and Governor directly accountable for the promises they’ve made to our children.

Nancy Budd

For the past thirteen years, I have been a third-grade reading tutor at a local elementary school. Serving as a judge in our Teen Court, I hear a high percentage of cases involving youth who are committing offenses on our public school campuses. In all of this, I have been looking at what works and what doesn’t, what about the system enriches our kids’ education and what gets in its way.

Keith Amemiya

The BOE needs to lessen its involvement in day-to-day decision-making and instead focus on setting policy and letting the Superintendent and her team handle day-to-day matters.

Charlene Cuaresma

“Get a good education. Education is your ticket out,” were the last words spoken to me by my mother, who died when I was 11 years old. Despite having only an eighth grade education, my mother’s message still resonates nearly half a century later.

Cheryl Lupenui

As individual board members making educational decisions, we must foremost take responsibility for our collective performance. We do this by a) demonstrating personal humility, b) establishing appropriate rules of engagement, c) fulfilling set board-level fiduciary and strategic responsibilities, and d) being a source of leadership and support to the Superintendent and other key stakeholders for the public school system.

Jim Williams

As an individual member of the Board, I would fully support the focus on policy (including strategic planning) and appointment and oversight of the superintendent as provided by the Constitution and Act 5. My first job will be to work with my fellow board members to ensure that our organizational structure supports the aforementioned focus on policy and strategic planning.

Brian DeLima

Resources are limited, priorities are being questioned, our citizens find it very difficult to meet their obligations. Our public schools provide hope for a positive future not only for the students that attend but for the families that dream of a better life for their children.

Wesley Lo

Our school system is extremely diverse in the communities it serves beyond just geography, and we need to be careful that we take advantage of the statewide nature of the DOE where it makes sense but do not allow a centralized formulaic approach to teaching our children. In a sense, I think that decision making needs to be closer to the students and communities we serve to effectively deliver education across our state.

Background

Here’s a cheat sheet on their professional backgrounds:

• First Hawaiian Bank CEO Don Horner has extensive business and management experience at virtually every level of a large financial corporation.
• Former media darling and current Kapiolani Health Foundation philanthropy director Kim Gennaula comes with a background in both communications and nonprofit work.
• Charlene Cuaresma, associate director of the Graduate Professional Access Program at the University of Hawaii, brings a blended background in education and public health.
• YWCA CEO Cheryl Lupenui carries with her years of experience developing leaders and leading grassroots initiatives.
• Maui Memorial Medical Center CEO Wesley Lo has a longstanding reputation in financial administration and community engagement.
• Keith Amemiya has experience with both K-12 and higher education — as former executive director of the Hawaii High School Athletics Association and current executive director for the UH Board of Regents. He also gained valuable skills in developing private partnerships to fund public education needs during his tenure at HHSA.
• Private attorney Brian DeLima has professional experience practicing family law and personal experience as the parent of a child with special needs in the public school system.
• Private attorney Nancy Budd has a long history of taking educational leadership as a parent, and later tutoring and mentoring students in Hawaii’s public schools.
• Voyager Public Charter School co-founder Jim Williams (also former executive director and president of the teachers union) brings an intimate knowledge of collective bargaining and what it’s like to administer a school that produces good results on a minimal budget.

If there’s something you want to know that’s not answered already, feel free to ask it in our Board of Education discussion and we’ll do our best to get an answer for you.