In 2013, in the State of Hawai’i, various community and HIDOE (Hawai’i Department of Education) representatives met to participate in an audit and redraft of Board of Education (BOE) Policy 4000, General Learner Outcomes.

It sought, in brief, " ... to develop in its employees and students the skills, behaviors, and dispositions that are reminiscent of Hawaiʻi’s unique context and to honor the qualities and values of the indigenous language and culture of Hawaiʻi."  In June 2015, the policy was approved by the Hawaiʻi BOE.

The Hawaii initiative may well stand alone in the world as a system-level example of re-centering education for all learners around a value system that is explicitly framed as centered on the original (indigenous) inhabitants' ways of knowing. Of course, educator and scholar calls-to-action about centering non-white ways of knowing abound in the scholarly literature (see, for example, Holly & Masta, 2021), as do examples of attempting to center indigeneity in educational contexts within tribal-only communities. To the best of our knowledge, though, examples of working models that attempt to be inclusive to all identities are very rare. (Although we’d love to be proven wrong.)

This self-learning module will challenge you to reflect upon the systems that exist within your programs and institutions and consider ways to reframe around values, not (just) intellect.

Institutional Data Analytics + Assessment