UPDATE: Dukelow was reappointed to the State Board of Education in April 2024.
Kahele Dukelow, UH Maui College Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs, was appointed by Governor Josh Green to serve on the state Board of Education (BOE) beginning July 1, 2023. She earned a Master of Education in Teaching (MEdT) degree and is completing a PhD in Curriculum and Instruction from the UH Mānoa College of Education.
Before joining the UH Maui College faculty, Dukelow was an elementary and middle school teacher in the Hawaiʻi Department of Educaiton (HIDOE). She is the current chairperson of the ʻAha Kauleo (AKL), a statewide council that advises the HIDOE Office of Hawaiian Education on Kaiapuni (Hawaiian language immersion education). She has served on the AKL board for ten years while working with a variety of organizations to advocate for Hawaiian education.
About her role on the BOE, she says she hopes to continue to be an advocate for a more equitable educational design for all. “I will work to promote equity, diversity, inclusion and justice in curriculum and assessment that moves beyond cultural awareness to address structural issues and policies,” Dukelow said. “… to triangulate historical, political and contemporary issues of race and identity, economics and society when engaging issues and decision making.”
Dukelow credits the late Sam Noʻeau Warner, renowned researcher, teacher, and Hawaiian language advocate, with encouraging and supporting her to go into education while she was working on her bachelorʻs degree in Hawaiian Studies. She says Aiko Oda, former COE Professor, was the one who created space for Kaiapuni in the COE, working through admissions, curriculum, and placements to allow Dukelow to student teach in a true Kaiapuni teaching position.
“My family and community instilled foundational values of love and care of people and place, collective good, mālama ʻāina and humility,” Dukelow said. “All of my teachers throughout my public school education on Maui and my experiences in the University of Hawaiʻi system have shaped my actions and thinking through diverse experiences. Specifically, my education at UHM in Hawaiian language, Hawaiian Studies, and the COE, taught me language, skills, histories, methodologies, and how to use those lenses to analyze situations and apply those principles in my work.”
