Community Partnerships
The Navigators’ Center was founded on the premise that wonderful resources for our students and families already exist in our community. In that spriit, the primary role for the Center is to link our school to those resources. There are a wide array of organizations and individuals we connect with to support our efforts. We are honored and humbled by the work of all of these supporters, and we welcome anyone in our community to join in our efforts.
A number of those actors have come to play a special role in the success of the Center and our entire school. We show our appreciation for the special contribution of these groups by recognizing them as our official community partners. Since the fall of 2012, a "Sail Plan for Community Partnerships" has guided each partnership. This document directly aligns the acitivities of all community organizations on campus with the established goals of Kamaile Academy and the Navigators' Center. You can learn more about each of our partners and view each Sail Plan through the links below. (Partners are listed alphabetically.) You can also view the template for our Sail Plan for Community Partnerships at this link.
“To close the academic achievement gap and improve outcomes for underserved students, redesign the entire high school experience.” Envision Schools was founded in 2002 on this simple idea. We believe the current achievement gap reflects a systemic failure to understand how kids learn, what motivates them to learn, and what they need in order to learn well. We employ the best practices of high school design —rigorous college-preparatory curricula, small and personalized learning environments, and a focus on measurable results—and add a truly innovative model that emphasizes project-based learning, development of Deeper Learning skills, integration of arts and technology into core subjects, real-world experience in workplaces, and a uniquely rigorous assessment system.
Envision is working directly with the faculty and staff of Kamaile to bring the model of their Bay Area schools to Kamaile Academy Middle and High Schools. Envision staff also work directly with our families and community partners to adapt their model to fit the unique dynamics of our school and community.
INPEACE (The Institute for Native Pacific Education and Culture)
Since 1994, INPEACE has been working to educate and empower Native Hawaiian communities. INPEACE has emerged as a local and international leader in early childhood education, workforce development, and cultural land stewardship. INPEACE is committed to improving the quality of life for Native Hawaiians through community partnerships that provide educational opportunities and promote self-sufficiency.
For years, Kamaile Academy has enjoyed a close relationship with INPEACE, serving as a host to a number of its highly acclaimed early childhood education programs and coordinating with other efforts of the organization. These areas of partnership include the following programs and initiatives: Keiki Steps, Keiki Steps to Kindergarten, P-3 Initiative Wai‘anae Project, Hō‘ala, Kupu Ola, Kūkuluao & Ka Lama Education Academy, Kūlia I Ka Pono, and Ke Ala Hānau Moku.
Leeward Community College- Wai'anae
www.leeward.hawaii.edu/leewardccw
Leeward Community College- Wai'anae (LCC-W) is a satellite campus in the University of Hawai‘i Community College system located on the beautiful Wai‘anae coast of Oahu. It offers a variety of first and second year college credit classes in liberal arts, education, business, and career and technical areas. Students can complete a majority of the course requirements for an Associate of Arts or an Associate of Arts in Teaching degree at LCC-W.
Kamaile Academy’s partnership with LCC-W is young but has already produced many promising results including college counselor visits to high school classrooms and collaboration among instructors at the two sites. Beginning in the spring semester of 2013, Kamaile High School students began taking dual-credit course at LCC-W. Plans are also being made for dual-credit courses to be taught at Kamaile through LCC-W instructors.
The Polynesian Voyaging Society (PVS) was founded in 1973 to carry out an experiment that would help answer some questions: how did the Polynesians settle the far-flung islands of the mid-Pacific – by accident or by design? Did their canoes and their knowledge of navigation enable them to sail purposefully over the vast sea distances between Pacific islands? PVS began with the building of a replica of a Hawaiian voyaging canoe, Hōkūle‘a, launched in 1975, to explore the seafaring heritage and the voyaging routes of our ancestors. Since its first voyage to Tahiti in 1976, PVS has explored the ocean of our ancestors in order to rediscover and perpetuate through practice Hawaiian voyaging traditions and values and to bring together communities throughout the Pacific. With a legacy of ocean exploration as its foundation, the Polynesian Voyaging Society is committed to undertake voyages of discovery (Holokai); to respect, learn from, and perpetuate through practice our heritage and culture (‘Ike); and to promote learning which integrates voyaging experiences and values into quality education (Ho‘ona‘auao). We are committed to nurturing communities and the leadership therein that values learning and sharing knowledge in order to foster living well on islands.
PVS has provided a number of invaluable experiences and resources for the students of Kamaile Academy over the past few years. From working with PALS afterschool classes and giving inspiration speeches to high school students, to taking students on 3-day coastal voyages and weekend training camps, PVS has had a major impact on many young people at Kamaile.
Program for Afterschool Literacy Support (PALS)
The Program for After-School Literacy Support (PALS) provides learning opportunities for a predominantly Native Hawaiian population of children on the Wai’anae coast of Oahu, Hawaii. PALS uses a place-based cultural project (PBCP) curricular framework that embraces the multiple cultural locations in which the children exist and utilizes community and place as the springboard for learning. PBCPs engage real-life, ways of knowing and doing and provide integrated opportunities for literacy teaching and learning across the curriculum. Students in PALS engage with teachers and other community members in projects that have relevance to their own lives and that nurture children’s identities as learners, community activists, and as stewards of the environment. PALS partners with multiple cultural and educational organizations and individuals including the Polynesian Voyaging Society (PVS), the Honolulu Academy of Arts, Ka’ala and Hoa ‘Aina O Makaha farms, and numerous local artists, engaging these community partners as both co-planners and co-teachers within the projects.
PALS has overseen the after-school program for grades 4-6 at Kamaile Academy for years, and more recently provided training and support to bring the PALS model to our K-3 students along with our 7-8 middle school students.
Sodexo, Inc. is a world leader in Quality of Daily Life Solutions in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, serving 10 million consumers in 6,000 locations every day. Our dedication to excellent service, corporate citizenship, and fighting hunger all come from one goal - to make every day a better day. As the leading provider of integrated food and facilities management services in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, we set out each morning to treat every person we encounter with the highest level of respect and service. And when you put that effort, expertise, and enthusiasm together, it adds up to “a better day” for our clients, their customers, and our people.
Sodexo manages the Kamaile Academy school cafeteria and has been a great support to our school community by serving healthy breakfasts and lunches daily to all students, managing the distribution of our Healthy Snacks program, and servicing community events.
Wai'anae Coast Comprehensive Health Center (WCCHC)
We are a Community Health Center that serves over 27,000 patients, with more than 139,000 visits annually through our six service sites. We are proud to consider ourselves pioneers in Community-governed healthcare, Telemedicine and Hawaiian and other Traditional Healing Arts in an Integrated Healthcare setting.
For years, Health Center (WCCHC) has been a trusted and respected health care provider in our community. Thus for the Navigators’ Center, reaching out to them for support was natural. Graciously, Dr. Ricardo Custodio, Medical Director and Pediatrician at WCCHC, offered to support our efforts at Kamaile through the medical students they host on their campus from A. T. Still University (ATSU) in Arizona. Additionally, Dr. Dan Fujii has become an invaluable partner in delivering dental care to our students and in bringing our medical trailer closer toward operation.
Dr. Custodio has included Kamaile Academy in his plans for the Wai‘anae School of Community Health. The Kamaile School-Based Clinic is listed as a Rotational Integrated Clinical Experience for medical students at WCCHC. Additionally, the Youth Health Corps, which hosts Kamaile students for its summer program, is included as an Area Health Education Center.
Wai‘anae Neighborhood Place is a community based program that provides family strengthening and support services to families and resources on the Wai`anae Coast. It is a place for `Ohana to work together and acknowledge the unique cultures, values, contributions and strengths of everyone, building a nurturing, stable and courageous community for all keiki to safely live the best lives possible-culturally, spiritually, academically and economically. Wai`anae Neighborhood Place strives to embrace parents by giving support, assistance, resources, opportunities and encouragement to successfully raise their children. Through Family Outreach and Community Outreach, Ka Wahi Kaiaulu – Wai`anae Neighborhood Place – builds the capacity of at-risk families to provide for the safety of children. Serving as a neutral hub for service coordination and community building, we work for positive changes that reduces environmental and social risk factors and increases protective factors; while providing access to resources, both concrete and informational, and support without judgment. We are open to all on the Wai`anae Coast and provide referral information of service providers and other various resources.
Kamaile Academy has partnered with Wai‘anae Neighborhood Place as a vital link to service providers along the Wai‘anae Coast who can support our students and families. The WNP staff has been an invaluable resource for our school community through case referrals, program support, and regular consultations.
United States Veterans Initiative
U.S.VETS provides comprehensive services to the veterans we serve, including case management, employment assistance, job placement, counseling, as well as drug and alcohol free housing. At our facilities veterans progress through a seamless continuum of services designed to help them increase their level of responsibility and prepare them to live independently in the community. Waianae Civic Center is the only U.S.VETS location that provides services to both veteran and non-veteran men and women, families and children. WCC began serving the Hawaii homeless population in March of 2007. Waianae currently serves 300 men, women, and children each day.
Kamaile Academy has worked closely with the staff of the Waianae Civic Center to coordinate the best support possible to our students and families who are in their program.
