The Story Behind Her Program.
After meeting with public school officials and teachers in 1999 while conducting independent national and state research on public education, Ms. Kahealani concluded that the State of Hawai'i, Department of Education (DOE) was not providing her children with an adequate education. She was further convinced that her findings were both reasonable and accurate when her second child was categorized as "gifted and talented," but due to a lack of state funds and the absence of a properly trained gifted-talented program instructor, her son was given a text with more difficult word problems as a remedy to the school's shortcomings. Her other two children complained of boredom in their classes as well. She decided to start her own education program with resources and information acquired from national and local homeschooling organizations. The challenge remained in time management and implementing effective lesson plans as she maintained a busy career while managing her program on a daily basis.

"I knew at that point I had to actively take control of my children's education," Kahealani recalled, "and not let them fall through the system. It's been my experience that children often complain of too much school work and try to manipulate their way out of it. My kids are a little different though. They wanted more challenging work. I felt they were learning by rote and not being intellectually challenged."

Ms. Kahealani views collective bargaining, improper funding, and long standing mistrust between state administrators and the Hawai'i State Teachers Associations (HSTA) as the major causes of Hawai'i's unreformed education system.

"It's a terrible system where many children in Hawai'i fall through the education cracks. The teachers complain about poor working salaries and conditions, the governor complains about complaining teachers, and parents complain about the complaining and no consistent results. As far as I'm concerned, Hawai'i's public school system is rife with internal problems. It's been this way since I was a student and it'll probably continue until a group of leaders or maybe one charismatic individual steps up to the plate and resolves the shortcomings. Until then the children suffer," Kahealani commented.

While she has overcome the initial frustrations of establishing her own education program with absolutely no outside financial assistance, maintaining annual progress reports with local school districts, and customizing a learning program that focuses on standard education and Buddhist studies, Kahealani admits that she certainly has no regrets and looks forward to guiding her program to completion when her student-children graduate and enter college. At a later point she plans to use her experience as a federal employee, homeschool program director, and mother to publish homeschooling material and curriculum models.

Mailing Address:
Attention: Program Director
Satori Dharma Hawai'i
P.O. BOX 17171
Honolulu, HI 96817-0171

Email Sandy @
satoridharma@mail2hawaii.com

Program & Class Web Sites
www.teacherweb.com/SatoriDharmaHawaii/MsSandyKahealani/index.html