Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 12, Number 10, 1 October 1995 — For some, Hawaiian immersion program grows too siowly [ARTICLE]

For some, Hawaiian immersion program grows too siowly

by Jeff Clark The state's Hawaiian language immersion program can't grow fast enough. Even as OHA is suing the Department of Education and the Board of Education over not providing enough opportunities in Hawaiian-language immersion, other 'ōlelo Hawai'i advocates are celebrating. They're happy because there are now two public schools, one eaeh on O'ahu and the Big Island, where English takes a back seat to Hawaiian. On Hawai'i, Nāwahīokalani'ōpu'u School opened in Hilo last year and continues to hold classes in the mother tongue thanks to assistance ($1.2 million) from the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. It's an extension of Hilo Intermediate School, run on OHA-controlled Hawaiian trust funds by 'Aha Pūnana Leo with state DOE teachers - Nāwahī is a

great example of laulima, or cooperation. In September, the new school year commenced with the opening of the Hawaiian languageonly Ānuenue School in Pālolo Valley on O'ahu. AJmost 200 students, some of whom travel from as far away as the Wai'anae Coast, attend Ānuenue. The OHA Board of Trustees approved at its Aug. 24 meeting a request for $43,613 in trust fuirds to help pay for bus transportation of Kula Kaiapuni immersion students attending campuses outside of their neighborhoods. Not everyone is so lucky — not every student who wants to be immersed in Hawaiian during the school day is able to so. As reported here recently ("OHA sues state school system over immersion," Ka Waī Ola O OHA June 1995), the Of¥īce of Hawaiian Affairs is trying to get the courts to force the DOE and

the Board of Education to make imroersion education available to all students. Hie suit, filed in circuit court in August, cites state and federal law (the State Constitution and the U.S. Native American Languages Act) as mandating an adequate immersion program. It declares that "the demand is

twice what the program ean serve" and that by offering the program only on a limited basis the state is violating the law. There are 950 students enrolled in the DOE's Kula Kaiapuni program. They attend 11 campuses on five islands. Many more students are waiting to get in the program, and eaeh

year the private Pūnana Leo Hawaiian language preschools produce scores of Hawaiianspeaking keiki ready to attend kindergarten in the public schools. DOE communications director Greg Knudsen was unable to say how many students are waiting to enroll in the immersion program.