Aloha mai kākou!
We are truly excited to welcome you and your unit to Cohort Kumukahi, the inaugural cohort of schools, colleges, and other units that will engage with us, the Native Hawaiian Place of Learning (NHPoL) Advancement Office, in a multi-year process to support the creation of your five-year NHPoL action plans.
This inaugural cohort is comprised of the following units:
- Cancer Center
- College of Arts, Languages & Letters (CALL)
- College of Engineering (CoE)
- College of Social Sciences (CSS)
- Division of Student Success (DSS)
- Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology (HIMB)
- Institute for Astronomy (IfA)
- John A. Burns School of Medicine (JABSOM)
- Nancy Atmospera-Walch School of Nursing (NAWSON)
- Office of Communications and UH News
- Thompson School of Social Work & Public Health
- Sea Grant
- School of Ocean & Earth Science & Technology (SOEST)
This webpage is meant to orient you to Cohort Kumukahi and invite you into the first professional development opportunity. The rest of this message is a bit lengthy, so you might want to return to it when you have more than two minutes. But bookmark this page because there’s important information with upcoming deadlines, the most immediate being Sunday, October 1, 2023. However in order to submit by that deadline, you will need time to get through some resources and a multi-section Google form. All that to say, keep this email handy and we hope to hear from you soon!
A short story on this inaugural cohort:
After the UH Mānoa campus approved the current strategic plan Mānoa 2025: Our Kuleana to Hawai‘i and the World, the Native Hawaiian Place of Learning (NHPoL) Advancement Office began working on our strategy to support the plan’s three goals specific to becoming a Native Hawaiian Place of Learning. One of the three goals is “100% of schools and colleges and other similar nonacademic units will have a five-year strategic plan to address each of the four Native Hawaiian place of learning strategic focus areas relevant to their particular units” (p. 19) by the end of the strategic plan period.
In spring 2023, we contacted the Provost’s Council and a set of deans, directors of ORUs, and vice provosts gauged readiness within their units and asked to participate. Cohort Kumukahi is the result. Other cohorts will follow. We are looking forward to engaging with you!
Cohort Kumukahi
NHPoL Professional Development Invitation Summary (October 2023)
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A note on the name Kumukahi:
Kumukahi is the name of the easternmost point of Hawai‘i Island and thus the easternmost point of the Hawaiian archipelago. Because of this, Kumukahi is often referred to poetically when speaking of beginnings, of something new. Since this is the first cohort of its kind, we thought Kumukahi was particularly fitting.
The Invitation
We invite you to join a 5-day in-person professional development opportunity for students, staff, employees, community partners and UHF liaisons in a Cohort Kumukahi unit, as listed above. Our time together will be a deep dive into the Native Hawaiian principles outlined in the UH Mānoa Strategic Plan. You do not need to have a background in Hawaiian language, history, or culture and you do not need to be Native Hawaiian to join. This is open to anyone who is interested in learning more about the Native Hawaiian principles for your professional and personal life.
Time Commitment
We recognize how busy everyone is and that this work requires a high level of presence and commitment. This 5-day in-person professional development opportunity is designed to be immersive, and therefore, you are required to be present for the entire time. We are offering this experience twice in the Spring 2024 semester to be as inclusive as possible of the various schedules you all hold. The dates include:
- March 18-22, 2024 from 9am-4pm (UHM spring break)
- May 13-17, 2024 from 9am-4pm (The week between graduation and summer school)
We ask for your availability for both sets of dates, but you would only attend one of these weeks. Please note that the 9am-4pm is a firm time commitment. Exceptions will not be made because we want you to benefit from the full experience, and we want your fellow participants to fully benefit from your presence.
The Commitment to Engage
First and foremost, this form is meant to help you understand the time and energy that will be expected of all participants and the content of the experience. A high level of commitment is important so that you and your fellow participants can have the most meaningful experience possible. After you fill out the form, the team who is designing your experience will review your responses to ensure that you will be able to fully engage. If we have any questions, we will reach out to you. If there is not space in your life right now, we encourage you to be honest with yourself and with us, knowing that you can join this work in the future. Everyone who fills out the form will hear back from us by December 1, 2023.
Directly below you will find a google form link for you to complete indicating your interest and availability to participate in the 5-day professional development opportunity. Please read below to gain an understanding of the intentionality behind it.
We estimate 45-60 minutes will be required to complete this form. Please fill out this form by Sunday, October 1, 2023 at 10 pm.
Google Form Resources
Please read/watch/listen to the foundational resources. These resources will be referenced in the form. They are also listed here for your convenience (we suggest you review them in the order we have shared them):
- UH Mānoa Strategic Plan (pages 7-14)
- Read “Our Hawai‘i Grown Truth” (4 pages) or listen to it here (14 minutes)
- Watch TRHT Vision Video (9 minutes)
The resources are short but hold quite a bit of information.
Nothing in this form is a test, so please do not review these resources in that context. Instead, we invite you to be present with the resources. The questions in the form related to these resources are purely reflective; there are no right or wrong answers.
Importantly, these resources are meant to invite you to spend time with the Native Hawaiian principles described in the strategic plan (Resource #1). The next two resources give some context for why and how they are relevant today given all of our current complexities and realities. You will see/hear reference to our Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation (TRHT) work. Our TRHT work is integral to everything we do. As you will see, it helps us honor the complexities of today while focusing on the Native Hawaiian principles.