STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2316

Honolulu, Hawaii

RE:    S.B. No. 3071

       S.D. 1

Honorable Shan S. Tsutsui

President of the Senate

Twenty-Sixth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2012

State of Hawaii

Sir:

     Your Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Education, to which was referred S.B. No. 3071 entitled:

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO EDUCATION,"

beg leave to report as follows:

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to appropriate funds for three permanent faculty positions and operating expenses for Ho‘okulaiwi:  ‘Aha Ho‘ona‘auao ‘Oiwi within the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Hawai‘i Educational Policy Center, Sovereign Councils of the Hawaiian Homelands Assembly, Ho‘okulaiwi Center for Native Hawaiian and Indigenous Education, Aupuni o Hawaii, and thirty-nine individuals.  Your Committees received comments on this measure from the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and Department of Education.

     Your Committees find that the underrepresentation of qualified native Hawaiian teachers in Hawaii's public schools negatively impacts native Hawaiian students.  Ho‘okulaiwi has initiated programs on the Leeward Coast of Oahu and on Niihau that provide training for teachers in the affected areas.  Ho‘okulaiwi seeks to expand its initiative by creating one additional teaching cohort to train teachers on the Leeward Coast and the island of Molokai.  The Office of Hawaiian Affairs has allocated grant funding to Ho‘okulaiwi for a two-year period. 

     Your Committees have amended this measure by:

     (1)  Inserting additional language suggested by the Department of Education in the purpose section to acknowledge other components in the curricula of Hawaii's public schools;

     (2)  Deleting language conditioning the expenditure of appropriated funds on the Office of Hawaiian Affairs' matching funds;

     (3)  Changing the effective date to July 1, 2050, to ensure further discussion; and

     (4)  Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Education that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 3071, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 3071, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Hawaiian Affairs and Education,

____________________________ JILL TOKUDA, Chair

____________________________ BRICKWOOD GALUTERIA, Chair