Leilani Kupo:
It’s not just my family, not, not just my Ohana, but I have my community, my neighbors that, that people that are watching me because I give them hope.That’s huge. So when we talk about mental health, that’s gigantic stress. It’s not just academic success. Then they’re trying to break out of like, I’m not just an athlete, I’m going to go to med school. So they overperform, there’s this piece around, over performance or, you know, like I’m not doing what I thought I was going to do. I wanted to be a doctor. I failed genetics. My love is really in English or my love is really in humanities, but I have that, that tension there.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Hello, and welcome to Student Affairs NOW. I’m your host, Dr. Glenn DeGuzman. Thank you for joining yet. Another podcast episode of Student Affairs NOW. So last year in March of 2021 I hosted a student affairs episode called amplifying Asian Pacific Islander Desi American voices. We used the abbreviated term, APIDA to describe our greater community and then episode and the podcast really was well responded to, we had a number of folks who just commented. Thank you for doing that episode. And one of our listeners, Dr. V, and I apologize if I mispronounce your name. But he checked in with us and he requested a episode to bring awareness to the experiences of Pacific Islander students who can oftentimes be overlooked within the greater APIDA conversation. So I scoured the country, but I brought together this phenomenal panel that I really was excited to bring together and sit down, talk story about their experiences and obviously their research when it comes to the Pacific Islander college students.

Glenn DeGuzman:
So let’s get started. And let’s get started on this podcast. So Student Affairs NOW is the premier podcast and online learning community for thousands of us who work in alongside and adjacent to the field of higher education and student affairs. We release new episodes every Wednesday, every week, every Wednesday, you can find details about this episode or browser archives on studentaffairsnow.com. We also want to give a shout out to our sponsors for this episode today. So Vector Solutions, formally EverFi, the trusted partner for 2000 plus colleges and universities. Vector solutions is the standard of care for students, safety, wellbeing, and inclusion. We also want to thank LeaderShape, go to leadershape.org. You can learn more how they can create a just caring and thriving world. At the end of this podcast. I also share more information on our sponsors. So if you want to check them out, we, we really appreciate that as well.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Again, my name is Glenn DeGuzman. I use Ingham pronouns. I’m the associate Dean of students and director of residential life at university of California. Berkeley. I’m recording this episode from my home in Livermore, California, which is the ancestral home of the unseated territory of the Pelmen tribe of the Aloni peoples. And with that, I am so excited because this took a while to get this group together. I was committed to this panel because there is just, they’re just going to come at you with a lot of good information and expertise. Dr. Leilani Kupo from University Nevada Reno, Dr. Kehaulani Vaughn from University of Utah and Sefa Aina from college. Welcome to the show. Let’s start with just sort of helping our listeners get an idea of who you are and a little bit more about you. So if you could give just an audience, a quick overview of who you are and your background to this topic, and let’s start with you Leilani

Leilani Kupo:
Aloha, I come to you as a descendant of the ancient navigators of the Pacific, those who navigated to the ancestral homelands of the and who are responsible for the care and feeding of the unseated ancestral and illegally occupied lands of the Hawaii. And I also recognize that I am a visitor of the ancestral homelands and the unseated and illegally occupied lands of the people. And each day that I come to work, I acknowledge my space and place as a visitor in this, in this land. And I ask for permission to enter, because that is part of who I am and how I have been raised. But also I ask for guidance because as the Dean of students at the University of Nevada Reno, my responsibility, my is to provide guidance to people, but also to live the values that have been instilled in me by my ancestors.

Leilani Kupo:
I am humbled and honored to be on this illustrious panel and to be with, with wonderful people that I have, I have learned to love and grow from grow with, from afar. My name is Leilani Kupo, she, her pronouns, and I am so excited to be with you all today. One of the things as I’ve been thinking about, what does it mean to be on this panel is what does it mean to be a Pacific islander student or an indigenous scholar who has not only had to make space and take space for herself in higher education, but also role model? What does that look like and feel like, and sound like, and be so bold to say, taste like and smell like, and then help others understand that it’s okay to be indigenous, to be Ole, to be native Hawaiian and to live our values of our ancestors when we’ve been told that it’s not, that’s not normal. And so my hope is that we can have that conversation today. And, and I know that that will happen because of my wonderful colleagues and friends that are also on this panel. And so I look forward to joining you all on this journey. So thank you, Mahalo.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you. Leilani, Kehaulani

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Hello, Mahalo Leilani and Dr. DeGuzman for having us take part in this wonderful conversation today, I’m currently an assistant professor in education, culture, and society, and the Pacific on studies initiative at the University of Utah. I’m also for post-doctoral scholar in critical indigenous studies at the university of Minnesota under the tutelage of Asete Diaz. My research really looks at higher education de-colonial practices, pedagogies, indigenous methodologies. I also look at trends indigeneity, which so I study the ways in which Pacific Islanders living in Turtle Island recognize their indigene,, their responsibilities by and through their relationships with native nations in Turtle Island. I’m also a practitioner of higher education and I’ve worked at several institutions, including Pomona college, UCR, UCLA, also co-founder of epic, empowering Pacific Islander communities. With my handsome fellow mentor from a different era, Sefa Aina. So I, I think our panel will create a lot of you know, talk story and Monolo on this subject because as a first generation scholar, I understand the importance of how student affairs operates in student’s journeys and how that can assist in someone being retained and seeing their full potential

Glenn DeGuzman:
And Sefa.

Sefa Aina:
I want to thank you Glenn, for bringing bringing us together and, and, and a wonderful fellowship to talk a little bit about who we are as a community, as a Pacific island community. My name is Sefa. I’m currently the associate Dean and director of the Draper center for community programs here at Pomona college. Prior to that, I worked at the Asian American resource center, also here at Pomona college, along with Kel. And and then prior to that, I worked at the UCLA Asian American studies center. And like Kel mentioned, we were part of a team that created a program called EPIC, empowering Pacific Islander communities, which is still going fairly strong. And it’s rooted in a lot of the things we, we kind of came across as higher ed practitioners and things we’re going to talk about today. So it’s, it’s really really good to be here with you. Thank you.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you. So let’s start at the top and this question is Kehaulani. Can you help me and our listeners with kind of, sort of a description, how do we describe our Pacific island or college students? Like, who are they and how would you describe this diverse community to others who may not be as familiar?

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Thank you for that question. And I think that’s a very important question because oftentimes like you said, at the beginning of the episode, we are a population that is often overlooked or we are made invisible, we’re erased, we’re erased and erased at the same time, so we’re not monolithic. We represent the descendants of the largest body of water Oceania. We’re the indigenous people of Micronesia, Melanysia, and Polynesia, and most people in Turtle Island, AKA the United States are familiar with Polynesians due to geographic proximity, but also due to military incursions in that region. Right. and so, you know, you’ll, you’ll see people who identify Pacific islands through very limited understandings, meaning stereotypes that say they’re all athletes, they’re all comedians, they’re all, you know, unhealthy, which could be true in, in numerous ways, but not understanding the full context because of colonialism and because settler colonialism.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
And so, you know, in terms of this population, it’s dynamic, it’s expansive. And there are quite a few Pacific islands that have entanglements and I say, entanglements, not relationships with the United States. And so then we have very vexed positions and status like that. We occupy meaning some of us are US citizens. Some of us are US nationals. Some of us are compact to free association. And those are just within, you know, the populations that have these entanglements with the United States, then we have undocumented, right? So we’re really looking at this diverse group of people there’s over 20 identified ethnic groups in the United States from the US census. And this, you know, kind of gives you a sense of these very distinct and yet categories that, and histories and experiences that do play a role in college going in higher education.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Right? So if we’re looking at, you know, certain groups of Pacific islands, you know, undocumented, they’re not going to qualify for, you know, aid, right. So there’s all these various things happening all at once within this population, that’s often overlooked, often the race often marginalized. We represent, you know, a very, very small community within academia at all levels at all levels. So from students to graduate students, to faculty, to administrators and I would really urge, you know all of our listeners to become more acquainted with our, our people, because we have a lot to offer as indigenous people. We have a lot of knowledge to offer in the ways that we move forward as a community who has to have relationships with one another in this globalized world. And so there’s a lot of lessons that we can learn from Pacific Islanders. And I know there’s a lot more that I’m not covering that Leilani and Dr. Kupo and Sefa can also add in to my very brief introduction to Pacific S and our, our students, and a lot of our students are first gen also. And so that adds a particular, you know, set of unique uniqueness and challenges but also the resilience, right, that I think we have learned since from time immemorial through our ancestors,

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you for setting the table because that that’s, that was really good, robust description of the community that we’re going to be continued to talk about. So you spoke about there was one piece that you spoke about, like, oftentimes the perspective can be lost. And so SFA, this question is for you. I want to expand on that a little bit more. I know you’ve done research on this, and I know that you used the term quote, invisible minority and quote in a book chapter, you co-wrote that centered on the challenges Pacific ISS face around a multitude of topics like colonial colonialism and immigration among other things. Can you specifically speak to the Pacific Islander students and the invisibility, they may face on college campuses or not may face, they are facing it, love your take on this.

Sefa Aina:
And I was just at long beach city college yesterday the grand opening of their mono program and with our wonderful sisters, our PI sisters Taylor Robertson and Carlo Kenny and I was telling them that, you know, when it comes to visibility or invisibility, it depends on who’s looking. It depends on who’s looking for us. You know, coaches know who we are, you know, football coaches know who we are. Campus security knows where we are. If you need security for your event, you know who we are. If you need someone to entertain you by dancing or singing, or you know, who we are, you know where we are not visible is like, what Kel said. We’re not visible on campus. You, our, our numbers are low you know, in the undergraduate the numbers overall and when, when that part of the pipeline is, is, is so small, you know, the numbers that then go onto graduate school, who then can lead into being an administrator like, you know, Dr. Kupo.

Sefa Aina:
Who’s one of the few native Hawaiians here on the mainland who are, who are at that level. Then you don’t have that pipeline. You don’t have a pipeline into the administration. You don’t have the pipeline into the faculty. And I know Kel’s story, because I’ve known Kel for a long time, and then she did grad school, like nobody else ever did grad school, you know, and, and she, she hustled and she grinded it up and to the, to the very end and, you know, no, no people should have to do that. And, and so, you know, our numbers are we’re invisible in the faculty links, you know, which then, you know doesn’t make space for them to be in the position one day to then hire other faculty to grow the pipeline. And I think one of the biggest places we’re missing is in the curriculum.

Sefa Aina:
There are not enough classes on, on native Hawaiian, Pacific calendar topics. It’s just, it’s, we’re not there. And, and we have solutions for the world, you know, our, our, our values and our our experiences and our culture are things that the whole world can learn from. You know, we talk about sustainability. Like, we, we are people who are sustainable, you know out of practice, out of necessity, you know, historically that’s who we’ve been. You know, we when you, when you see the kinds of conflict you’re seeing in the world today, you know, there’s this we know how to reconcile, you know, we know how to do things in a way that preserves humanity or, or actually lifts humanity. So by, by not being in the curriculum, we’re hugely invisible. And, and therefore, I don’t, I think it’s a disservice to all students in higher education, but yeah, that’s what I would say.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you, Sefa, you spoke to the invisibility, you spoke to just getting Pacific islands into the pipeline and it, and it seems to be an issue about getting Pacifics to college and then keeping them in college. So, Leilani, I got a question for you around that. Can you speak to the challenges that faces communities in just getting to college? And then once there, obviously there are additional challenges in, in getting them to persist and to graduate. If you can also speak to that and with, you know, there’s just so many issues that are emerging, I think broadly about mental health, the hate crimes against communities of color. How are these realities impacting Pacific island populations and your recommendations suggested suggestions for others?

Leilani Kupo:
Sure. That that’s so big, right? That’s, that’s such a huge question. And so I invite Dr. Vaughn, I invite Sefa to join in as well. You know, like when I think about the pathways to, to college, or even just the schooling for, for our Pacific Islander youth I think about the messaging, I think about the messaging for many of our youth some of the messages are your only pathway is to go to jail, to go into the military. I think about what Sefa just said about, like, you can be an athlete, you’re going to be security. You’re going to be the bodyguard. You need to fit a certain profile, your body type. You’re not going to be smart enough. So if you’re not smart enough, then you going to do extra things and work extra hard to meet certain criteria, right?

Leilani Kupo:
So those are the messages that we’re receiving. And then your gender also fits in that too. Right? So if you, if you are man identified, then there are certain things that you going to fit into. If you’re a woman identified, okay, you going to get pregnant, you going to do X, Y, Z. Right? So those are already conditions that some of us are being told that we have to fit into. Then you have the other, one of, some of the other messages of you have to overperform in order to get out of this. And so there’s, these assimilator practices of you. You going to, I’m going to say it, you going to act white, you going to colonize yourself. But then if you colonize yourself and you get the good grades and you, and you’re able to, overperform how you going to pay for school?

Leilani Kupo:
You going to look for the resources. You going to be rock. You going to be real smart and how to navigate because you going to know all of the rules. And so when you think about the pathways and some of the message, just the messaging that some of us receive, not all, but some of us receive. That’s one of the things that we are that some of our communities do have to navigate and navigate very well and strategically. And so I always think about my, my grandfather would always tell me he’s like Leilani and he survived missionary schools. So that that’s important for, for folks to understand. So he is a product that he was a product of the missionary school. He survived the missionary school and he would always tell me, Leland, you’ve going to know the rules of the colonizer in order to survive the colonizer, but you going to figure out how to be Kanaka.

Leilani Kupo:
You going to figure out how to, how to be true to yourself and how to embody our values so that you can continue. I don’t know, I’m six years old, how’s a six year old supposed to internalize that. But I, I kept that because he would continue to teach me that my would continue to teach me the importance of caring for the land for Malama ina. Like she would continue, I kill plants, but I try not to like, you know, I try to continue to, to live and embody her, her values. And so when we think about the messages that we received about assimilation, you going to act white, you be white, you going to figure out what are the rules in order to be successful. When I think about the ways in which that pipeline or that pathway, what that looks like and feels like for our youth, if you’re, if I’m receiving messages about this is the only success pathway that I have, that does a lot for me psychologically.

Leilani Kupo:
And so I either have to break that out or I have to have people in my life that are saying that there is different for you plus there’s resources. And if we look at the economics and the resources that are available for many of our Pacific Islander communities, we don’t have a lot of resources that are available to us economically. So there’s some of those pieces that come along, we’re in under-resourced districts or we are in low resource schools that we might be the smartest ones, but we don’t have like the highest SAT. So ACT on and so forth. Right. But we have really smart kids. Like we’re brilliant. Like Sefa said, we’re so smart. Like we know how to think differently, but we going to, but people have to understand that thinking differently is just as good as the atory ways.

Leilani Kupo:
Right? So when we get to college, we then have to have people who understand that decolonize ways of knowing indigenous ways of knowing other ways of knowing are just as valuable. But when we get to college, what we’re also seeing is that many of our scholars are having to figure out like, what does it mean to be Pacific Islander? Cause I then going to justify my identity as Dr. Vaughn was saying, do I fit into this norm? What is my identity? Am I like, do I look enough? Do I act enough? And then when I’m on campus, do I look and act enough when I go home? Do I, am I too much? Or am I not enough? So there’s that psychological piece. There’s also the stress and the pressure of your community, of your family. I say that not only from my own self, but from the scholars that I support and I like, they’re talking about like, it’s not just my family, not, not just my Ohana, but I have my community, my neighbors that, that people that are watching me because I give them hope.

Leilani Kupo:
That’s huge. So when we talk about mental health, that’s gigantic stress. It’s not just academic success. Then they’re trying to break out of like, I’m not just an athlete, I’m going to go to med school. So they overperform, there’s this piece around, over performance or, you know, like I’m not doing what I thought I was going to do. I wanted to be a doctor. I failed genetics. My love is really in English or my love is really in humanities, but I have that, that tension there. And so, so there’s these disconnects of X of the, the societal expectations, the, the performativity expectations of like, what does it mean to be specific Islander enter in the cultural norms. That’ll go along with that as well. And, and then how do we fit those expectations?

Glenn DeGuzman:
Wow. Leilani, that was so deep, there were so many points that you just brought forth. Sefa, Kehaulani. I don’t know if there’s, if you can add or if there’s something that Leilani shared that you wanted to expand on, there was just so many good points in that, in that response.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
As Dr. Kupo was saying, you know, I think the complexity of these issues is just, it’s enormous, right? Like, so you have people like who are, you know, Hawaiians Kanakas that are in, you know, an occupied space. Our land, our ina continues to be occupied and we continue to be pushed out of our homeless over 50% of Hawaiians, no longer live in Hawaii anymore, not by choice. You know, the cost of living is so high, right? So then you have this displacement that occurs, right where Hawaiians are now living in the lands of another native nation, another indigenous people. However, we suffer from the same socioeconomic issues, right? In terms of not being well educated being pushed into certain areas or industries we’re overly policed, overly criminalized. And so you don’t have enough mentors or people that look like you in these spaces in higher education.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
So then you start to believe that this is not relevant for me. This is for other people. This is not for me. This is for other people else. I would see more people that look like me. We continue to be the objects of study in classrooms and in higher education, we continue to be the research and not the researchers, right? And so like once we, we need to make this shift we cannot continue to, you know, say we value, you know, Pacifics or we value equity, diversity inclusion. And there’s this huge piece that continues to happen, especially within indigenous communities in a particular Pacifics. We need to believe that as a people, as a community, we have these amazing gifts. Like, you know what Dr. Kupo was saying, like what Sefa was saying in terms of we have that knowledge, we navigated without instruments using the stars, right?

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Who knows more about sustainability people that have to live on islands. , you know, with certain resources, we are the masters of these things. However, you know, we need to have administrators, we need to have more student affairs professionals understand the complexities, but also understand that there’s resources needed, right? We need resources. We need pathway programs. We need pathway programs with Pacific Islander staff, faculty. We need more faculty positions. We need API studies. We need to make these connections for our students, for our youth that says higher ed is a place for you. You can explore whatever you want in terms of if you want to pursue humanities, why not? We have scholars in the Pacific that are great literature scholars that nobody even talks about. Right. So, I mean, you know, just reflecting on when I used to teach at the Claremont, one of the beginning exercises that I used to do with my students, and I would say, we’re just doing an inventory, right? No pressure, no pressure. And I would just put these PostIts around the room, simple questions, like, okay, name, a famous Pacific Islander. You know, they usually like know Troy Palm and all the athletes, right. Or the rock know, or say something that Pacific Islander are known for health, diabetes, , you know, name one Pacific Islander scholar.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
They would list Sefa and I just to list someone, but you know, there’s a wide genre. There’s a field, there’s a field out there. So the thing is, I would tell the students, it’s, it’s not that you should blame yourself. This is institutional, this is colonial. This is part of this process of, of making these ideas that Pacific Islanders are good for these things. Like what Leilani and Sefa were saying. And they’re incapable, incapable of doing these other things. We’re incapable of being brilliant. Hello. We were brilliant. We continue to be brilliant. and you guys, you know, so I just think, you know, there’s a lot of things that are going on within this, you know, expansive population of people, expansive community. We have, you know, these various histories that are ongoing in terms of colonialism, settler, colonialism, but we also are racialized in certain ways.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Right? So like, depending on the population, depending on your gender or, you know, it, you are racialized in a certain way. And so then you’re dealing with all of these other issues here. So, I mean, yeah, I think I would encourage PI communities to, you know, advocate and we have been in terms of, that’s why we created epic. Right. and, and start saying, you know, we need to be seen, we need to be acknowledged. And let’s start doing the research that we need to do for our community. However, you know, there’s a responsibility on higher ed institutions and, and K through 12 to also contribute because if not, then I don’t think it’s benign anymore. Right. It’s not a benign ignorance, it’s you, you know, that you have a responsibility and if you’re not working towards fulfilling these needs, then you know, you are part of the problem.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Sefa. Did you want to add to that? Or I, or I can expand. I’d love to expand and go deeper on what Dr. Vaughn was just speaking about.

Sefa Aina:
Well, It’s just, it’s just that I would just say, you know, it’s tough to find, you know solutions or fixed civil rights issues that are rooted in human rights violations. You know what I mean? I think you know, how cake track said it and wrote it, you know, the moment you start advocating for the civil rights, you kind of surrender your, your human rights, your rights as first peoples. And, you know, as people who are really big on genealogy and you know, understanding who, what our history is and where the fractures are, are important to helping us find solutions.

Glenn DeGuzman:
You know, what I’m taking away is you’ve all of you have identified so many of the, the challenges and issues that are facing the Pacific Islander community. And you’re just touching the surface at this point. And I, and I’m curious to know from all of you, given your experiences and your work and your research what advice would you give? And I’m going to break this down into, you know, our listener base ranges, right? We have a lot of newer student affairs professionals and mid-level student for professionals who we all know work directly with our Pacific Islander students. We also our listeners also include faculty, include student affairs higher educated faculty and student affairs decision makers, folks are on higher level positions. So what message would you want to, or advice, or would you give them to, to help them get started in their respective roles on how they can raise awareness and how we can begin to tackle this? Because you’re right. I, I like what you, how you, you framed this. If we’re not doing anything to fix the problem, we’re part of the problem. So, you know, we’re student affairs let’s fix the problem. So I’d love to hear from all of you, maybe Dr.Vaughn If you can kick us off, but I’d love to, from all of you on this question,

Kehaulani Vaughn:
I’ll, I’ll actually toss it to Sefa since he’s student affairs, the longest I think.

Sefa Aina:
You, well, you know yeah. I have been in student affairs pretty long, but, you know, I sort of took a non-traditional role to student affairs. You know, I was a student activist on campus. Like many of us were and I was a student activist at the UCLA campus in the early nineties. And, you know, there was a lot of things happening in California, you know, like prop 180 7, prop 2 0 9, all these propositions that were rolling back the protections of people of color in the state. And you know, it was quite an an environment to learn and, and to sort of come of age, and then you cut your teeth. And then I met these Pacific Islanders who were just among the smartest Pacific Islanders I’d ever met. And we weren’t, they were committed to not perpetuating stereotypes.

Sefa Aina:
So we were not doing Luaus. We were not, you know we weren’t going to do any of that stuff. You know, we were about the politics, you know, we were forward thinking and we didn’t have Pacific Islander studies. So we shared books with each other. And and that’s where we, you know, read, you know from a native daughter, we read Albert Went books, we read all, anything we could get our hands on. And that’s how I came into student affairs, because when I graduated from college, a position opened up at UCLA’s Asian American study center. And it just so happened that it was in student affairs and and I saw it as a way to kind of continue my activism. And particularly in this particular role, it was a position in a unit called student and community projects.

Sefa Aina:
So our job was to connect our campus with the community. And you know, if you’re familiar with the UCLA Asian American study center, it’s pretty old school, was there when, when writing her memoirs, when I showed up UG was there, I coined the term, you know, all these amazing Asian American folks, you know, who I just, man, I was like, you know, I was the kid, you know, in, in, in the group. And you know, what I learned from them was that, you know, it it’s time for us to serve the people like we exist to serve the community. And so my you know, beginnings and my entry into, you know, the way I was imprinted in student affairs was that, that was the mantra was sort of the very sixties kind of like, you know, let’s get, let’s get out there and make some change, you know, you know what I mean?

Sefa Aina:
And so and then over the years, you know, by being in the field, I kind of learned other things like identity development and all this other stuff that’s, you know, sort of traditional student affairs types type things. And so what I’d say for me, what sustained me is that I had the connection off campus. I’ve always, you know looked for that, you know, that balance, you know, when we’re at UCLA, we created a thing called PEERS, got their education education retention, which works with Carson long beach Inglewood. And in places like that and a student retention, high school student retention program that’s run out of UCLA. I, I was able to be fortunate enough to help create a group called NPIEN, the national Pacific Islander educators network. We worked on this pro program called the pipeline program, which led into epic.

Sefa Aina:
You know, when, even here at, at Pomona’s a friend of mine who lived in the city of Pomona, told me about a tongue church that he lived by and, you know, I, I walked in and introduced my son said, Hey, I’m Sefa. You know, can we do something? You know, and, and 12 years later we’re still running a program it’s called step. And I that’s, that’s what I’d say, you know, kept me kept perspective. You know, I feel like, you know, I, I always make fun of the kids because you know, here, you know, we got hummus, you know, the squirrels running around, like how bad is it really? You know what I mean? I know, I know it sucks, you know, you’re feeling marginal, but let’s go out there and make some change. You know what I mean? Because I feel like for me, what it did for me was a source of retention.

Sefa Aina:
It kept me and as a professional, it keeps me grounded, you know? So I would say to all the young folks coming through the pipeline, make sure you have ways to keep yourself grounded, you know, make sure you have that community because, you know, we are people, you know, the all Alto that means the path to leadership is still serviced. That’s a proverb that existed in the Samoan community before missionaries came. You know what I mean? Like we’re at our best when we’re serving our community. And so that doesn’t go away when you become the Dean of something or, you know the director of something like those things have to still be part of your, and, it’s not just it’s not just after school programs. Like this is what helps bring balance into your body.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you, Sefa. Leilani, Kehaulani? I love how we’re just going to,

Kehaulani Vaughn:
I’ll go then. You know, similar to, you know, what Sefa was saying, I actually, you know, attended a small, private, liberal arts arts college in Southern California college. My story there is probably like a lot of people who are first gen. We didn’t even visit campus before move day. My mom was like, she made the decision. She’s the matriarch, she’s my sister and I we’re twins. She’s like, want you going to UCLA? the other, one’s going to be in LA, too. You’re going Oxidental. Everybody was like, is this a dental school? You know, nobody knew. And, and, you know, feeling that type of like marginalization, not only were there not, there’s a few people from Hawaii, there’s a few Hawaiians from commitment schools that attended, but in particular, not having Pacific islanders that were from Turtle Island and having that type of experience as well, not seeing faculty or staff that look like you not seeing yourself in the curriculum.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Right. It was like, I took one class in Asian American studies and it was like strangers from a different shore, you know, about, you know, Asian migration to Hawaii, but there was no Kanaka presence in the book. Right. And I’m like, I was excited because I saw some words that were Hawaiian, like right. Or something. But you know, not to be seen as, as people not to even be visible had a huge pull on me to, you know, not only contribute to imposter syndrome, but also to, you know, just think that I could do this right. That I was, I was worthy of it or something. And so I had an Asian American administrator at the intercultural community center my last year Alice Hong who handed over native daughter to me. And because I was telling her about my feelings, I was like, why is there such a huge diaspora in Hayward, California?

Kehaulani Vaughn:
You know, like why is there such a huge Hawaiian diaspora in Alameda county, there’s certain factors that have pushed us out. Right. And then she handed over native daughter and the rest is history. You know, I finally found like a book that spoke to my experience. I finally found like a scholar or, you know, it made like the possibilities of, you know, studying, researching our communities for ourselves a possibility the fierceness, right, the Aloha that how money gave really is what I wanted to embody. And so like I always tell, you know, my students who are, who, who are feeling marginalized, like you know, intersectionality is a great way of looking at things in terms of like finding connections where you can, you know, finding, you know, I talk about indigeneity, so it’s not just about Pacific Islanders, but like let’s broadly talk about being an indigenous person.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
Let’s broadly talk about our experiences as women of color in academia. Let’s broadly talk about being first generation. Let’s broadly talk about being, you know coming from a household that was single parent or low income, right? So there’s ways that we can find these connections. And I think, you know, kind of keeping the specificity in mind, but also like thinking about expansive ways of understanding each other is really important. And I think advocacy is key in terms of, you know, trying to make sincere, authentic connections in the community, not just so that you can fulfill a grant or do a study or do some research, but longstanding connections. That will be key when you’re working with Pacific Islander and indigenous communities in general, because they have a long history of being exploited because of research or for the purposes of research. So to, you know, combat that you’re going to have to create these reciprocal relationships that are ongoing.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
You’re going to have to show up, you’re going to have to use your gifts. I always tell my students and you know at the Claremont, when we used to work with Sefa, I was like telling our students, you have so many gifts that you can contribute to, you know, this community that we are part of right outside of our college campus. Right. There’s a huge Tong community. And at the time when I was there and I don’t know if it’s a change, but there wasn’t a single Tong student enrolled at the whole consortium. And it’s like, they’ve been here since the sixties. Why is that even a thing, you know, shouldn’t we be having like this pathway, that’s already set up with this community. But yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s trying to create these relationships being in community, sincere community, genuine community, and not just for something that you can get out of it, but like thinking about how you can be of service, like what Sefa was saying.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
I think that’s really key and that’s really important being an advocate for people who may not look like you, right. Don’t just shoulder tap, Pacific Islander people to be the experts, find resources to pay them. like, I would say there’s so many, there’s limited people and higher ed has a lot of resources. So it behooves us to, you know, kind of look at the ways in which we are honoring someone’s knowledge, their time. And if you’re going to work with community, I would encourage people to, you know, pay them like you would pay consultants. Right. But with a longstanding goal of, I want to be in community, I want to be of service. How can I help, you know, and be an advocate for those who may not look like you or come from the same background as you. And I know Leilani has Dr. Kupo has more to add.

Leilani Kupo:
So circling back to what Dr. Vaughn and Sefa have shared, I think the, the, the first thing to really center is who, who are you serving? Who do you serve? And for what reason are you serving? You know, it’s, it’s really like, I, I think about that every day and it’s not about myself. It’s about the community. And decentering myself really helped me better understand the community at which I’m coming into. I also, I also really think about this, this idea of Pacific islanders are not monolithic and that each community has a rich, deep culture that I have a responsibility to learn about. And so that this goes right back to what Keh was talking about, that we have a responsibility to do homework and to do some really deep and concerted and intentional research and to do some emotional and intellectual labor that does not exploit the people that we are trying to support.

Leilani Kupo:
Because I think that there is this, there are these moments at which people come to me, I’m talking from myself, my own baggage, but people will very easily come to me and be like, oh, well, tell me about this and how it’s going to be real easy to work with all Pacific ISS. And I’m like, you understand, I am one person who grew up on Turtle Island. So I’m an off island Hawaiian. So I cannot tell you about all Hawaiians and I cannot tell you about every Pacific islander and you probably don’t want to know my opinions because I’m going to tell you something you don’t want to hear. And I cannot speak to that whole experience also, like, why are you going to exploit me? There’s a lot, there’s a lot that’s deep down because that’s very colonizing. That’s very exploiting. And that’s just, that’s what the missionaries did.

Leilani Kupo:
And so, so there’s there’s work that has to be done. And there’s an opportunity to do some work and then to triangulate to be like, so I learned about this and then go find some friends before you go and exploit some Pacific Islander people to be like, so this is what I learned like, is this right? Do not turn me into a vacation. Because that’s, what’s happened for me and some of my my Pacific Islander colleagues where we get turned into these vacations, rather than because people want to save us and we’re not broken, we don’t need to be saved and we don’t need to be fixed. And I think like shifting that idea that our scholars are not broken the student, the Pacific Islander students who come into our universities, the ones who are at university of Nevada, Reno, they’re not broken.

Leilani Kupo:
They do not need to be saved the ones at Pomona, the ones at Utah, they do not need to be fixed. We are just in a different space. And we, we are taught differently. We see the world through a different type of lens. And I think that that is really powerful. And so, as, as practitioners, as student affairs, practitioners and scholars and scholar practitioners, however, we identify ourselves that we have an opportunity to change the field from that of fixing our scholars to how do we reimagine the ways in which we interact as a Dean, a director a faculty member, a program coordinator, a mentor that we’re not fixing people, cause people are not broken that we are not here to colonize. Like we’re not going to adopt that as similar to, or colonizer mentality that we’re here to provide support that is relevant and make sense. And that we’re here to learn from each other after we do our own homework.

Glenn DeGuzman:
And I’m going to follow up on that is that yes, that we have a lot of homework. I have a lot of homework and you know, it is critical and essential that student affairs, higher education professionals, we need to do our own work to better understand and not necessarily always lean on Pacific Islander student affairs, higher education faculty to save us or to fill in the blanks. You know, that is our obligation. I want to ask y’all because I think one of the things for me personally, is that when I am learning, when I am continuing to understand a community or better understand the experiences of others I think about like key people, authors, writers, there’s just different ways to learn. So I’m curious from all of you, like for, for the, for our listeners, what is a book? I mean, there’s so many, like, I think we, that’s my that’s our homework. We going to look into that as well. But if you could pinpoint or pick one or two things that you would encourage our listeners to, to look up a book, an author, a performing artist or podcast like what would you recommend for, for others to enhance their awareness, a Pacific experience?

Glenn DeGuzman:
And Sefa, do you want to go first?

Sefa Aina:
Sure. so I, I read this book a few years ago. They Who Do Not Grieve by CF Gal is, is SAMO writer. And she writes amazing fiction. It’s really engaging. It’s a way to kind of know our community, you know through, through storytelling. So she, she’s a, she’s a wonderful storyteller any book by CF? I would say

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you, Dean. Dr. Kupo.

Leilani Kupo:
Okay. So I had to, I had to look it up. So one is by Jay Alani Kauanui it’s called Hawaiian Blood. And so the one thing that I didn’t get to say is I always look outside of education for my own education. And so Cal Newi is a phenomenal human in first place. Second of all is an anthropologist, so sociology, anthropology and writes a lot about politics, but then also Hawaiian culture. And so I would say that Hawaiian Blood is really great. And then also writes a lot of just prolific and very interesting texts that focus on politics and the Aina. So a movie that I would recommend is actually out of Alora, it’s called once, was wor once we’re warriors. And it’s about the experience. And I think oftentimes we, you know, when we talk about who, who are the Pacific Idlanders, who lot focus on on native Hawaiians or Hawaiian, there’s some focus on Samoans and we forget about everybody else. And so the mare once we’re worried was, is a pretty phenomenal movie it’s an older movie, I think it was made in the 1990s, but it, it does provide a, a different kind of insight. So thank you. And Dr. Vaughn.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
I have a list for days so I’ll keep it quick though. So, you know, the book that we’ve all been quoting a Native Daughter was a key book in my own growth as a scholar and a lot of other Pacific founders or indigenous people who read that book, find all of these connections with, with how many work in talking about settler, colonialism, Hawaii, and imperialism in the Pacific decolonizing methodologies, key book, if you’re going to work on any type of research with indigenous populations, I always assign pieces of that book in all of my classes. It talks about the ways in which you should be approaching indigenous communities, how to approach, how to create a research agenda how to just be in community and you know, how to like create this pathway of indigenous researchers, right.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
And our own methodology, our own frameworks. Great, great, great scholar who talks about the mind body and the spirit, right. And oftentimes in the ways that we reflect on research or do work in academia, there’s this disconnect that doesn’t account for us as humans, as indigenous people Myle Arvin a great native Pacific feminist scholar who is writing about possessing Polynesians. So the way that Pacifics within the social sciences through like eugenic notions, get categorized as Polynesians as a group that is categorized as almost white and Polynesians on the anti antithesis of that as being almost black. Right. So how social science has contributed to these ideas of whiteness and blackness within our own communities? Meli murals is a great film. I, I always encourage films because I think there’s so much work that can be captured within film that, you know, oftentimes when you’re reading an article or when you’re reading book, I’m nerd, I love all this stuff, but, you know it just, it, you know, our youth they’re creative.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
They, they like these types of expressions of visualization. And so like meli murals, there’s so much films out there. You know, regarding, the stories that we tell throughout greater Oceania. Another thing is at the U we created the Pacifica archive. And so we actually had talk story sessions with Pacific islander scholars. One of them TETA Kelie from BYU, Hawaii Len Meyer, Christine Delly, who’s a Chamorro scholar. We also have people from the community who, who share their higher education journey in this archive and talk about their own experiences of higher ed, but then also like what professions they’re in. Cause sometimes that doesn’t align right directly. And as first generation scholars, for many of us, we need to hear stories like that, that you can get a degree in English and still do public health or something.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
But I would really encourage, there’s so many resources out there. There’s so many, you know, that talks about Oceania and the mindset in which we need to change, you know, thinking about ourselves as this small group of islands and juxtaposing that to like, we are the largest body of water that encompasses all these islands, we’re the highways, right. So really thinking about the ocean and how that’s part of who we are and where we live and it’s expensive. So not diminishing ourselves and the ways in which, you know as Dr. Kupo was saying, in terms of like the way that Westerners try to categorize us to belittle ourselves. So I think there’s so much work being done. There’s and for solutions there’s work that’s being done right now. So there are solutions that are out there.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
There’s mono charter academy here in Utah that I really have to plug it’s a Pacific Islander culturally based school and here in Utah, but it’s diverse. So, you know, the whole mission is to have Pacific Islander culture in, in what they’re learning. But it, it services diverse students. So like, it, it reinforces the idea that other people can learn from our culture, our mono, our knowledge, our knowledge systems. But there’s so many things that are going on in the community where people are doing the work. They are, they are creating the solutions. We have the solutions we are doing them. It’s just kind of highlighting them and giving enough resources to the people that are already doing this work.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Yeah. And we’re going to and I know that for our listeners, we’re going to put a lot of these resources that we were just listed at the in our website. So if you go to soon, first now.com you, you can reference, if you want to look into one or many of these different types of things that was shared, we are coming to the end of our podcast. And with our time remaining we always ask this question of our panelists and it’s really just sort of like, we have this conversation and wow, this is the reason everyone, why I brought this panel together, because there was just so much good information shared. And so I really want the panelists to close with sort of a one minute thought about what are you thinking about what’s what are you pondering? What’s exciting you, or maybe what’s troubling you now, and I’m going to actually ask Sefa, Dean, I dunno if you could kick us off as well.

Sefa Aina:
So I, I talk about this a lot lately, so there’s, there’s this thing in our Samoan culture, it’s called and it’s sort of like a life life occurrences that are, that can be burdensome, like your funerals or weddings and things like that, where, you know, everyone is expected to give money. And and you know, that could mean the difference between paying your rent and helping your family, or, you know, keeping the lights on and helping your family. And, you know, over the years, it’s caused a lot of stress and it’s cause even a lot of folks to, to sort of disassociate with the culture and say, well, you know, that’s bad and you know, why should we have to do this? And and you know, I take a, a different approach to it. It’s, it’s that, it’s not that the culture is bad because the richness of the culture is coming together.

Sefa Aina:
It’s that we’re not ready. You know, our young people are not going to school. You know, young people are not putting themselves in a position to be financially stable, to support their families. So going to school and being educated is about saving our culture. You know, it’s not just about you going out there and doing your thing, you know, as an individual and making this kind of money, whatever this is literally about saving our culture, we will not be able to practice our cultural values because we can’t afford to, you know, and, and everyday life. And, you know, the, the remnants of, of historical injustices will continue to havoc on our, on our identities until we are totally. And we’re just big brown people, beautiful, big brown people, but just big brown people. And so that’s what I’d say, you know, that’s been on my mind a lot. It’s like not about, it’s not just about goal school, whatever, whatever it’s, this is about saving our culture. This is about saving our people. This is about saving our way of life. And so that’s why it’s important.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you, Dr. Kupo.

Leilani Kupo:
So I often think about my grandparents. They are, they, I don’t know why most, most recently they’ve been on my mind and, and as my dad as well, my dad passed away in 2013. And so all three of them have really been on my mind lately. And, and I think about the ways in which they have taught me to survive within these spaces, but also what it means to thrive because the messages of survival around safety and the protection of our culture and the values were not just about the, the protection to close oneself off, but it was really about how to perpetuate and to thrive in spaces. Similar to what Dean, I know what Sefa was talking about is like, what is, what are the ways in which we can, can continue and celebrate who we are so that we have a legacy and that we can continue the powerful knowledge and the ways of being that our ancestors have laid out for us.

Leilani Kupo:
And I’m always, I’m always thinking about like, how do I share that information with our with our Pacific Islander students, but then also with those that I, that I work with in a way that one is not sharing too much is not sharing the, the being too vulnerable or sharing the secrets of the family. Right. But is also being, being caring enough and sharing enough of my myself to, to be able to say like, this is important and this matters. So trying to find that, that I don’t want to say balance, I don’t another word for it, but being able to find like that, what that would be, what does that look like and feel like, and sound like for me but also protecting myself and, and then also being able to, to find space for others, to be able to share themselves as well.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you. And Dr. Vaughn close us out.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
So as I said in the beginning, my work is really looking at trans indigenous recognitions so the ways in which like what Leilani and Sefa, Dr. Kupo were saying, in terms of like, we have these understandings of ina or land, how do we embody these understandings and these protocols in Turtle Island? Right. So like the way that Dr. Kupo, you know, introduce herself, she said, it’s my responsibility to identify the land in which I am on. And, and not only acknowledging going past acknowledgement, right. Like trying to build those relational realities that are sincere. Right. And so I’m, you know, thinking, you know, thinking about, you know, PI studies in Turtle Island, right. Do we just talk about the Pacific or do we have a responsibility to contextualize the place in which we are in? And if we’re going to do PI studies in the diaspora, we definitely, as scholars have a responsibility to give the context in which to the place and to the people and to the land in which we continue to be fed, not only physically, but, you know, spiritually, the land is taking care of us.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
We have a responsibility back to these people. And I think, you know, just kind of highlighting these stories where that does occur, right? These bodies of knowledge get, continue to kind of cross across time and space. Right? And I want to document these stories because they’re not only like reminders to us as people of Oceania who are on someone else’s land, who’s being hosted by someone else’s land and resources, but also it gives us glimpses. It gives us hope about how we can create communities, not just amongst Kanaku only, right, not just among Pacific Isalnders, but also are tied to these greater conceptions of responsibilities to place and to land. These are decolonial possibilities. And so how do we strengthen and how do we tell these stories? And I’m committed to that work because I don’t want Pacific Islanders in Turtle Island to kind of just identify themselves as these people that are static, right.

Kehaulani Vaughn:
These notions of, okay, my aina, my Homeland is back there, but I don’t have a responsibility to this place in which I live in. And I work in and my family lives in. So I’m, I’m really trying hard to kind of create these and showcase these relational realities that are taking place. These stories that are taking place that are resisting, right. They’re saying, Hey, we’re, we’re practicing suviving, right? We are not only surviving in this world despite colonialism, right? In spite of all these things, we are creating new understandings of the places that we live in. And I want that for our youth, because I, we have that knowledge. It’s just about creating that community together and really demonstrating how these relationships are working and continue to work because this is not just happening recently. Actually these are recent expressions of, of these ongoing relationships between Oceania and turtle island. So that’s what I’m committed to.

Glenn DeGuzman:
Thank you so much. And really thank you to this panel of guests, Dr. Leilani Kupo, University of Nevada Reno, Dr. Kehaulani Vaughn, University of Utah and Dean Sefa Aina from Pomona College. Thank you for joining me today. On this episode, I want to thank Nat Ambrosey behind the scenes as always, she takes care of us and makes sure that this episode is ready for release. I want to thank our sponsors Vector Solutions. How will your institution rise to reach today’s socially conscious generation? These students report commitments to safety, wellbeing and inclusion are as important as academic rigor when selecting a college, its time to reimagine the work of student affairs as an investment, not an expense for over 20 years Vector Solutions, which now includes the campus prevention network. Formally EverFi has been a partner of, of choice for 2000 plus colleges, universities, and national organizations with nine efficacy studies behind their courses.

Glenn DeGuzman:
You can trust and have full confidence that using the standard of care for student safety, wellbeing, and inclusion. Transform the future of your institution and the community you serve. Learn more at vectorsolutions.com/studentaffairsnow, and also to lLeaderShape. Thank you. LeaderShape partners with colleges and universities to create transformational leadership experiences, both virtual and in person for students and professionals with a focus on creating a more, just caring and thriving world. LeaderShape offers, engaging, learn learning experiences on courageous dialogue, integrity, equity, resilience, and community building. To find that more, please visit them www leadershape.org/virtualprograms. Or you can look them up on Facebook, Twitter, Instagrams, LinkedIn. These shows would not be possible without their support. So I want to thank our audience listeners for tuning in joining us on this topic on Pacific Islander college students. I hope you’ve been celebrating and learning more during this Asian Pacific heritage month of 2022. If you’re not our newsletter, sign up, go to our website studentaffairsnow.com. I’m Glenn Guzman. Thank you for listening and watching. Have a great day. Bye everyone.

Vaughn, K., Saelua, N., Taione-Filihia. A. (2021) Cultivating a Cultural Kīpuka: Pacific Islander practitioner reflections in About Campus 26(1): 30-35. 

Hafoka, I., Vaughn, K., Aina, I. & Alcantar, C.M. (2020). The ‘invisible’ minority: Finding a sense of belonging after imperialism, colonialism, and (im)migration for Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders in the United States. In R. T. Teranishi, B. M. D. Nguyen, C. M. Alcantar, & E. R. Curammeng (Eds.), in Measuring Race: Why Disaggregation for Addressing Educational Inequality. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.  

Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders in Higher Education: A Call to Action (2020). 

A Community of Contrasts: Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders in the United States, by Empowering Pacific Islander Communities (2014). 

A Community of Contrasts: Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders in California, by Empowering Pacific Islander Communities (2015). 

The Seeds We Planted by Noelani Goodyear-Ka’ōpua

Possession Polynesian by Maile Arvin

Decolonizing Methodologies by Linda Smith

A Native Daughter  by Haunani-Kay Trask

Films

Mele Murals

Noho Hewa

Pacific Islander Artists

Terisa Siagatonu

Kathy Jetnil-Kijner