 Aloha. This is Think Tech Hawaii and welcome to this show. It's The State of the State of Hawaii and I'm your host, Stephanie Stowe Dalton. Today's show is about education in Hawaii. We previously focused on the Hawaii Department of Education's newest school in Abba, a charter middle school named Dream House, which builds student success through an empowering leadership model. Now today we're going to look at an earlier landmark school model at Kanai Pono Elementary School. It was supported by the Kamehameha schools over several decades. And our guest today is Ron Dr. Ron Gallamore, emeritus from UCLA and UH Manoa professor who led a historic study of Hawaiian families on the leeward coast in the late 60s. Of that study's many findings, one in particular showed how much Hawaiian youngsters' success in public school classrooms greatly differed from their success with their daunting responsibilities in their homes and community. When the study concluded and the findings were published, officials at the Kamehameha schools took notice, particularly in the evident lack of Hawaiian student school achievement. They decided to support development of a program based on the leeward coast study findings in order to improve school success for lower achieving students and to export and finance such an effective program to Hawaii's public schools. In addition to improving student performance, this initiative would expand the Kamehameha schools reach to many more Hawaiian and part of Hawaiian students than were served on the campus at the time. So welcome back Dr. Gallamore. Thank you very much. Happy to be here. Thank you for participating today again to talk now about the progression from the study in the field and in the community on the leeward coast to how the Kamehameha schools went about supporting development of a research based program aimed to increase school success for the slow performing Hawaiian students. Now we know that after years of work with teachers and other experts, the program achieved significant student learning gains, especially in reading. So our talk story today is about how the Kamehameha schools got this program for how Hawaiian students can succeed in a school commensurate with their peers to a great degree. So I think that you know there's some big questions here that we can touch on simply because we don't have enough time. I know that that's going to be a constraint, but there's so much that happened that's appealing to our audience I believe and those of us interested in improving education for all students, especially here in Hawaii. Let's just talk about the experience of developing that program and as it is based on the study findings you had and how you started that. How did you get started on that? That would help us know the first step. Well this is now going back more than 50 years and I just thought about that while you were speaking that it was a half a century ago and it happened in a consequential conversation in the parking lot of Nana Ikopono Elementary School in Nana Kuli. I had attended a session out there of the community organization efforts by the State of Hawaii that was led by Pinky Thompson and one of the attendees was Jack Darville who was then the assistant to the president of command man and in the parking lot after the meeting he said, Ron I know you all have been out here doing this study and we're looking to find ways to reach out to more Hawaiian kids in the public schools and he said have you got any ideas? That's where it started Stephanie in that conversation and everything that followed really started with that. I find that very human of him as the leader of the K-12 institution that's been in operation for I'm almost a hundred years, I mean I'm much more than a hundred years and that his concern was great and yet he was thinking about it from a general education stance whereas you were a researcher and what went through your mind when he asked you that? How did you think to communicate to him? Well here's one little more piece of context. I was 31 years old. I was clearly wet behind the years. I had just been part of this incredible study of Hawaiian families and the community in Nanakuli. It was not quite winding up. We still had some time to go but I was young, green as grass and I must say I went home that night overwhelmed with excitement and fantasies about what could happen. Now as I said we had some ideas and we had been actually trying them out. I'll talk about that a little bit later. We'd already been trying out things in the Nanaikopono elementary school but I knew I was over my head. I mean I didn't, I wasn't up to responding to this opportunity that was being suggested so I didn't know at the time by the way that Darvel who was in the assistant was about to be elevated to the presidency of the Kamehameha schools on the retirement of his mentor who had recruited him from the east coast. Well what were you doing in the Nanaikopono elementary school there while you were still with the study group out there? Did you have with those the kinds of ideas you you sought to be clear on, clear on with talking to Jack Darvel? So what what kinds of things were you trying to do there? What was that initial really kind of experience? This was in the spring of 1969 and I had already been living and working in the Waianae-Nanakuli area for three years. We actually my family and I lived in Waianae just down the road from Nanakuli and in the first two years we were there education was not the focus. It was family, life, child development, more psychological, sociological, anthropological questions but the longer I was there the longer I was struck by this discontinuity between the struggles the kids had at school and what I saw in their their capacity, their abilities at home the things they were able to do and I think this did not make sense. So Scott McDonald who was a community psychologist working in the in Hawaii at that time he and I volunteered to become the school psychologist for Nanaikopono school and we were being supported by the research project and we were both clinical psychologists and we said look we'll take referrals from teachers for issues because this way maybe we can learn something and maybe we can help a little bit. Well we all we agreed to do this only on the proviso we would not take students out of the classroom we would go to the classroom and work with the teachers and try to help the teachers find better ways to handle the problems they were referring to us so we had done almost 200 referrals when Jack Darville asked me do you have any ideas and the idea that Scott and I had come up with is because most of the teachers did not come from the Nanakuli area or were not from the native Hawaiian community we thought one thing that would really help is if the teachers got a more thorough training or professional development in classroom management adapting to the ways these children behave taking advantages of the strengths. So that was the idea I had in my head the day Jack asked me do you have any ideas but like I said I was green and I I knew this was going to be much bigger than anything that I had ever tried before and that's how I went to the head of the clinical psych program at UH Roland Tharp and said hey Roland I just heard about this great opportunity I'd really like for you to team up with me and see what we could offer them and the way of us some ideas on how to go forward. Well I'm interested in that your your first hunch or your observation in the schools rendered this management suggestion to yourself and to work on that with the teachers in your conversation with the teachers. So did you see that as potentially a key feature one of the key features of an initiative that management and why why was the management quite so out of out of line what what was so out of line about the management in the Hawaiian classrooms. Well the simple way to look at this is you know the Department of Education had a fine curriculum you one couldn't really say they were up to date on the curriculum but what we observed Scott McDonald and I observed in those classrooms was the kids weren't finishing enough of the curriculum over the course of weeks months and a year to ever be a grade level they just weren't getting enough work done it seemed like a lot of time was spent moving from one activity to another which reduced the amount of actual instruction and learning time and Scott and I worked with teachers and we began to share with them some of the classroom management strategies that had Roland Tharp had written about in his book that had just been published the year before and these things really work suddenly the students were doing more academic work there was more learning and their performance began to improve and I realized or I thought wow maybe we've stumbled on to a way to improve things for Native Hawaiian children. And what was the name of the Roland Tharp book? It was called Behavior Modification in the Natural Environment in the Natural Environment which was a step ahead with the behavior the behavior modification. It moved behaviorism away from the old approach that many people have been critical of because Roland took it into community settings and worked with teachers and other service providers to show them how they could use the principles to engage clients students more effectively and Scott and I were trying those things out and they really seemed to make a difference. And that allowed them to have more time with on the curriculum that that you know was not being covered well can you give us an example of that like what would a teacher do? Well for example we discovered that in many classrooms when students were not paying attention or weren't doing their work the teachers focused in on the ones that were not doing the work and they you know tell them to get busy settle down and we got them to switch that over to pay almost all attention to the students who were doing what they were supposed to be doing praising them calling out and saying Kalani is really finishing up her writing now look oh my goodness how and look over here this group is really getting their work done in other words more positive atmosphere in the classroom and that made a huge difference these Native Hawaiian kids responded to that really well. Right that that is very interesting and did you congratulate yourselves for that application and and how did that also derive from the what you had seen in their home settings so was that picking was that reinforcing what they was happening to them at home? Well I wouldn't say Hawaiian parents did a lot of positive stuff what they did was you know give the student or the children assignments taking care of younger siblings doing laundry helping with meals cleaning up outside doing gardening and the siblings I think created a positive atmosphere among themselves and what about the the social connections of that was that a factor too in the in the in the home that they were all working together as that was kind of you know creating a working together harmony now that's the ideal not every family did it let's not you know no community you know nobody in every community does the best the highest ideals of the community or the culture yeah or that was some of the things we created in the school but I don't want to mislead here and say we were reproducing in the classroom what you would have seen in it you know in a Native Hawaiian home and in on the non-akuli homestead they're just such different situations you're asking the kids to do different things you have a large group of kids of the same age things are very very different and you know the that but but this positive atmosphere did seem to make a difference but we were very constrained because we were outsiders we didn't yeah any authority I think the people and the teachers the administration and the teachers appreciated our efforts but yeah we weren't in a position to say well let's start with a group of kindergartners or first graders and let's do a whole year and two and maybe we can teach them to read faster and better we couldn't do something we were just with one little problem at a time well that's that was also an important model is to take take a focus and move with it so you were also modeling the researchers approach which I'm sure was well taken to or not and if it wasn't I'm sure they invited you out but that that sounds like a nice step forward what about the organization of the classroom where as we are grappling with now a bit with virtual versus in-person teaching here during the COVID um were they working in the schools then on uh what we we call that kind of a cemetery model where it was much more structured rows and columns or what what what was that situation like it varied across classrooms remember this is the late 60s a few years later the Department of Education the Hawaii State Department of Education introduced learning centers as a statewide initiative I think early 70s but in in the late 60s you had a mix you had some teachers that were doing small group learning centers and others were doing the rows of desk so it varied there wasn't a consistent pattern well with all this success behind you with the the study of families and now these these activities in the public school what what came out of of your ruminations on this what did you actually go to Darville with to answer his question or did you what were the next steps in this area when I teamed up with Rowan and he he agreed that we become a you know a two-person team and we started talking and we came up with the following idea that we would propose uh to Darville and the trustees that Kamehameha become the preeminent knowledge center for the teaching of native Hawaiian children that they would become the experts and that they would do that through a research discovery and development model that is we would start out with the ideas that we had from the Leeward Project but we would make turn turn the portion of the Kamehameha schools into an R&D program that would develop knowledge and the third element would be that they would share this information freely with the public schools once the knowledge was developed and we were sure that something would work we would send out teams of people uh to work in the public schools on all the islands that was the dream that was proposed to the trustees in 1970 uh let's do research let's turn Kamehameha into a a a juggernaut a powerhouse of knowledge about how to teach Hawaiian children and and all children not just Hawaiian children but primarily dealing with the problems of the native Hawaiians and the public schools and that once that knowledge was gathered it would be shared with the public schools in an aggressive way supported by the bishop estate in the Kamehameha schools that was proposed in 1970 the trustees acted on it in early 71 and we started up in the summer of 1971 and our first classroom in the lab school was 1972 okay so in order to get that first class into the lab school in 1972 what kind of budget did you have how did the Kamehameha schools actually support this I mean this is one of the problems with charter schools here in the state and maybe elsewhere too is that you get the approval and you've written your your proposal and all that and then there's no place to go you have to find your own physical setting and that is quite an obstacle so how did how did all this get solved for you all get a class in that fast well of course we have to give a lot of credit here to the enlightened trustees of the time who bought into the idea of Kamehameha becoming a research and development knowledge base and also the administration of the of the camp schools completely bought into this and so they made a five-year commitment now the first year the first class was held in an old disused dormitory on the Kapalama campus and that was our first kindergarten class was in a commons room in a dormitory that was no longer in use and we began designing and constructing in early 71 the building of a four room classroom in at the bottom of the hill of the Kapalama hill just inside the property of the Kamehameha schools and that that building opened in 70 I think maybe 73 is when we opened up and moved in so they made a major commitment because the five-year commitment we told them you know there's no magic here we we only have an idea about what to try but if we're going to stick to the research and development model we have to try it out and learn from our mistakes and make gradual improvements so we see that sign slide and then quickly and then the first classroom picture Melissa can you yeah there you go so this is this is the front that signed for the building um the actual lab school building and notice Kamehameha school early education program Stephanie just want to make a note today early education usually means preschool but in 1970 it meant like early elementary school because preschools were not that common so we called early education because we meant you know three to twelve or something like that that's what we meant by it so it's a little bit of a misnomer in today's world well yeah well it was K K one two three yeah that's what you said three to twelve yeah but you could go on to twelve yeah we had ambitions of moving beyond third grade at the time okay all right and so that next slide shows us a classroom inside that the building that was built and you see the features of that classroom include those windows up above so Ron can you talk about what was on there with classroom in those windows well up up in the upper right hand corner hanging from the ceiling was a video camera if you look up there it's to the left of those red columns on the bulletin board there's a video camera and inside that glass that's reflecting the ceiling lights is a observation platform or deck that you can view the entire school every classroom every child and we had cameras to videotape what was going on in the classroom for subsequent study and I might add for the extensive professional development that was provided to the teachers because we did not assume that if we had some bright idea and said okay try this that that would be an instantly turned from an idea to action so we worked extensively with teachers to transform these ideas into classroom practice instruction better lessons that went on constantly and the next picture shows being on that observation deck which gives you a better view of how there were four classrooms that could be seen through them for distinct separated classrooms that could be viewed from that deck so in addition to the videotaping when when asked for or required or or done then they there was live observation of the teachers to are those the kinds of methods that were right so new teachers that were higher could sit up there and watch the experienced teachers and then discuss with them later what they had seen we also brought in people from the public schools and other okay situation students from the university so they could learn by watching so you could stand up above the classrooms and have dialogue over what was what's happening in the classrooms as well as make a permanent record to use later in teaching courses or in professional development so um but i don't know that was it referred to as much as a lab school that wasn't on the sign it was can i pono or the keep for the commandeer early education yeah that's just our informal reference to it we would say we would call it the lab school but it you know can i pono which i think means i'm probably going to get in trouble here but i think it means we'll look it up yeah and right yeah i'm a language person i know we that we're supposed to know the name what that means but it was 50 years ago yeah well i wanted to ask you to talk about the teachers who were going to come into that environment and uh teach and also learn more to teach so you were looking for experienced people not experienced people uh university grace people what were you doing for that to get people to come in and participate in such a daunting setting it's a challenge for first of all we couldn't offer permanent employment so people were only given a one year contract for a year so our first two hires were people who were one was a teacher returning to the classroom and one was a recent college graduate who turned out to stay with us many years right to the end and was a major contributor and the following year two uh public school veterans joined us and uh so by the time we moved into lab school we had four teachers and two grades k and one because we were adding a grade a year carrying over the kids who came in uh each year we carried them over through third grade so and by the way one of the we these children were randomly selected from the schools in the Kalihi Palama schools area so these were kids pulled from from the center there of Honolulu the Kalihi Palama area and the only criterion was that you know they they had to be children who would be eligible for free reduced lunch so we want to make sure that we were serving children who were from you know homes where you might expect that you'd want to you'd want to learn how to teach to these students rather than say do a random selection draw so this was quite different from the Kamehameha selection process for the main campus we were going for the poor families and kids who would normally not get to attend the Kamehameha well this was no small feat to get them there every day and uh in that regard having the support of Kamehameha was important and um I'm sure you are familiar with the big buses that went out at 5 a.m to go get these youngsters who were way far away like you said they were on the Waianae Coast and they were back to the Leeward Coast and they were way up in the North Shore and places like that to to make sure that the selection of children were okay needed now you talk about sobering up the researchers who suddenly are involved with operating a real school only things like you have to pick the kids up a bus system you have to have a bus schedule and you have to have people checking them in and off the bus because if you lose one of those kids that you're not going to be able to explain that to the parents very well and all of that any any researcher who thinks that when they walk into a public school it's all about the research has to understand all the effort and systems they have to be in place to get all the students in that building at a certain time with people to supervise them and that sobered me up immensely from the rest of my career working with public school teachers and so the whole effort you know to even put in place a single classroom as you say as you as was done the K group that came in at us at in in what 72 I think you said that you went to the new space and and so that what about 25 or so kids were in that group and that before that group ever could come in to to engage the education process there was all this other crap that you had to make sure actually at the time the average class size for first kindergarten first grade in the DOE was about 27 28 but we took in 32 we wanted to make sure we ended up the year because you're you might lose a kid or two right because we we were pulling kids from the local feeder schools elementary schools and the parent would always have a chance of pulling a student out to go back to the public school now that didn't happen very often but we actually had larger class size than the public schools well let me just say that we're kind of has to we're coming to hello hot time we're going to need to wrap up so if you could show the picture of the the last two pictures Melissa to show the people that were involved in them so that's the group that you're talking about Ron that came in and took this on or a little smaller group than that this is probably tiny bit later but then also the children that were being served by by this program are there in this next picture and I really am so intrigued at your story Ron and we're getting then to getting that program started and having some understandings about what that took in addition to the command mass school support and buildings and budgets and then you've got your teachers and so we'll have to continue on with with and see I have many more stories some are very terrifying to me but I'll be happy to share them great great and so you were out of time and have to wrap I'm Stephanie Stoll Dalton this is the state of the state of Hawaii on the ThinkTech live streaming network series we've been talking remotely with Dr. Ronald Balamore and this is about the Kamehameha early education program in the Kanai Pono school that was supported for so many years and and attained such success so we look forward to seeing you next time in on a Monday in two weeks I'm Stephanie Stoll Dalton thank you thank you very much