Our History

• 1888

  Marion Scott, principal of Fort Street School, begins offering informal classes in pedagogy for teachers.

• 1896

  The teacher training department and the high school are separated. Honolulu High School is renamed Honolulu Training School and moves to a small building on the grounds of Royal School. The teacher training department moves to Victoria and Young Streets and is renamed Honolulu Normal and Training School, a part of the Department of Public Instruction.

• 1905

  Honolulu Normal and Training School is renamed Territorial Normal and Training School and moves to Lunalilo and Quarry Streets, where it would remain until 1931.

• 1907

  The College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts is founded as a land-grant college in temporary quarters near Thomas Square. Castle Memorial Kindergarten becomes part of the college.

• 1912

  The College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts is renamed College of Hawai‘i and relocated to its first permanent building in Mānoa Valley, now known as Hawai‘i Hall.

• 1920

  

  The College of Hawai‘i becomes the University of Hawai‘i with the addition of the College of Arts and Sciences.

• 1921

  Benjamin Wist (later dean of Teachers College) succeeds Edgar Wood as principal of the Territorial Normal and Training School. Wist is credited with raising standards of admission, establishing differentiated curriculum, developing in-service media, and working to achieve degree-granting privileges.

• 1925

  Dr. Thayne Livesay becomes director of the Department of Secondary Education and establishes a prescribed curriculum for preparing high school teachers that includes practice teaching.

• 1930

  Two new buildings are constructed by the Territorial Department of Public instruction on the site for the Territorial Normal and Training School, marking the construction of what will eventually become Wist Hall and Wist Annex 1. Teachers College is composed of two schools: the School of Elementary Education (K–8) and the School of Secondary Education (9–12). By 1935 all students are enrolled in a five-year program leading to a BEd plus a “fifth-year diploma.”

• 1931

  The Territorial Normal and Training School is merged with the University of Hawai‘i’s School of Education to form Teachers College, with Benjamin Wist as its first dean. The Founders Gate is built across University Avenue to symbolically unite the two campuses

• 1934

  Ninety-six graduates make up the first Teachers College graduating class.

• 1936

  Teachers College offers its first MEd degree.

• 1946

  Hubert Everly (later dean of the College of Education) becomes principal of the high school with a charge to expand to K–12.

• 1948

  Bruce White succeeds Wist as the second dean of Teachers College. White encourages “creative” teaching and is responsible for securing federal grants to finance an experimental Auxiliary Teacher Training program, which prepares graduates in fields such as social work to become teachers. University High School Building 2 is constructed adjacent to Building 1. The schools now offer a complete K–12 curriculum.

• 1951

  

  Teachers College Building is renamed Wist Hall by the Board of Regents in honor of Benjamin Wist who served as dean of Teachers College for seventeen years. The first class graduates from University High School.

• 1956

  Hubert Everly becomes dean of Teachers College and is an outstanding proponent of public education at the territorial and later state legislatures. Everly reorganizes the college into departments and organizes the faculty senate to act as a policy making body.

• 1959

  

  Teachers College becomes the College of Education, and Hawai‘i becomes the fiftieth state.

• 1966

  Following the recommendation of the Stiles Report, the College of Education undergoes a major reorganization. The departments of Curriculum and Instruction; Educational Administration; Educational Foundations; Educational Communications and Technology; Educational Psychology; Counseling and Guidance; Health, Physical Education, and Recreation; and Special Education and the Divisions of Field Services and Student Services are created. A new College of Education unit called the Hawai‘i Curriculum Center is created by Dean Everly as an organized research unit. The first doctorate in education (PhD) degree is offered in Educational Psychology. The role and function of the laboratory schools changes from demonstration and teacher training to research and innovation. The intern program is dropped and the college becomes an upper division college.

• 1969

  Hawaii Curriculum Center is renamed the Curriculum Research & Development Group (CRDG) and charged to develop curriculum and materials for schools. Arthur R. King becomes director of CRDG. The elementary, intermediate, and high schools are combined and renamed University Laboratory School (ULS). ULS becomes an R&D site within CRDG.

• 1980

  

  Andrew In, former teacher and principal of ULS and associate dean of the college, becomes dean of the College of Education.

• 1986

  John Dolly becomes dean of the College of Education following Interim Deans Peter Dunn-Rankin and Daniel Blaine. John Dolly served as Dean until his resignation in 1995.

• 1988

  The Center on Disability Studies, a charter member of a National Network of University Centers and the Association of University Centers on Disability (AUCD), is established as the Hawai‘i University Affiliated Program.

• 1998

  Randy Hitz becomes dean of the College of Education following Interim Dean Charles Araki.

• 2007

  

  Christine Sorensen becomes dean of the College of Education following Interim Dean Donald Young.

• 2009

  ULS separates from CRDG and operates independently under its own charter school governing board. The ULS-CRDG R&D collaboration continues.

• 2012

  

  Donald Young, formerly director of the Curriculum Research & Development Group, becomes dean of the College of Education.

• 2018

  

  Nathan Murata becomes dean of the College of Education on January 1, 2018.