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Lokelani Lindsey, one of five Kamehameha Schools Bishop Estate trustees, spent an hour answering listener questions about the estate's recent changes in educational strategy. The standing question is how a self-sustaining charitable trust — one that must generate its own income from investments — should allocate resources among the estimated 40,000 Hawaiian children who will never attend a Kamehameha campus. Lindsey defended the decision to eliminate several community outreach programs, arguing that full-time preschool instruction had proved more effective at preventing educational risk than remedial programs introduced after children had already fallen behind. She explained the restoration of merit-based admissions for grades K-12, while preschool enrollment remained on a lottery, and described the new Neighbor Island schools — initially serving grades K-3 on Maui and the Big Island — as a way to keep younger children near their families. Callers raised trustee compensation, which Lindsey described as a statutory two-percent commission on estate earnings; the estate's management of former Hamakua Sugar land; and allegations of micromanagement in curriculum and communications decisions, a charge she partially acknowledged while defending the policy rationale.
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Companion newspaper commentaries
Commentaries by the guests, published in The Honolulu Advertiser around the broadcast.
