INPEACE’s Ka Lama program aims at getting more Wai‘anae Coast residents certified to teach in the schools within their community. In recent years, the Delores Curtis Scholarship has helped immensely in achieving this goal. A retired University of Hawai‘i professor, Dr. Delores Curtis seeks to honor the memory of one of her most cherished colleagues through this scholarship fund.

It’s been said that discipline is “remembering what you want.” For Mrs. Leihualani Naldoza, that has certainly held true when it comes to her family’s finances. The Hilo resident and Ho‘oulu Waiwai program participant explains what it was like for her and her husband prior to finding INPEACE’s financial capabilities services:

Nalani Galariada grew up in Nanakuli on Hakimo Road. Back then, life was all about riding bike, roller skating (on 4-wheels), playing in the quarry (now Sea Country), marbles, skyheenee (sky inning), and chase master with her sister and neighborhood friends. She remembers a different kind of childhood, one not concerned with things like crime, drugs, and human trafficking. 

The Indigenous Early Learning Collaborative (IELC) is a community-based inquiry project created by Dr. Tarajean Yazzie-Mintz, Founder and Principal Consultant of the First Light Education Project, in collaboration with the Brazelton Touchpoints Center (BTC). The W.K. Kellogg Foundation has generously committed $1.5 million to this 2-year project to support these indigenous community projects. INPEACE’s Keiki Steps program has the honor of being one of four selected Indigenous communities in the IELC, representing Hawai‘i and our lāhui kānaka ‘ōiwi. INPEACE joins three other indigenous community serving organizations as part of the IELC: the Wiikwedong ECD Collaborative of Keweenaw, Michigan; Wicoie Nandagikendan, an immersion program in urban Minneapolis; and Daybreak Star of Seattle, Washington. 

What began as a desire to uplift the brilliance of our kūpuna as a means to engage Hawai‘i’s youth in science, has evolved into INPEACE’s new Kaulele Project.  Designed to be a traveling pop-up indigenous science center, Kaulele is working to create exhibits that provide hands-on interactive learning opportunities, presented through an indigenous lens and focused on Hawaiian cultural practices.