Support needed
Support needed
With school back in swing, after-school programs got into gear, too.
High quality after-school programs keep kids safe, inspire them to learn and help working families. They give our keiki a chance to engage in hands-on learning, expose them to career opportunities in the sciences, teach them the value of service to the community and provide them with mentors, healthy meals, physical activity and more.
But not all young people are able to participate. A study commissioned by the National Afterschool Alliance found that for every child enrolled in an after-school program, two more would participate if a program were available.
In Hawaii, 59,057 kids would be likely to participate. To a great extent, the problem is funding.
Members of Congress also are getting back to work after their summer break, and one of their assignments will be to consider legislation to support a host of education programs. When they do, they’ll choose between a bill that removes federal support for after-school programs and another that wisely preserves it.
I hope you’ll join me in urging our elected officials to preserve or — better yet — increase our investment in after-school programs.
Our families, communities and country will be better off if we make after-school programs available to every child who needs one.
Paula Adams
Executive director,
Hawaii Afterschool Alliance (www.hawaiiafterschool.org)
Mahalo, vets
Though I am a Christian who does not believe in the deification of dirt (like calling lava flows and mountains sacred or deities), I also am an American and a veteran who believes the place (Punchbowl Cemetery) where the bodies of thousands of our veterans who paid the ultimate price to protect our religious and civil freedoms are buried ought to be the most sacred place in this state.
Without the mighty American military — which included people of many races, besides America’s white and black people (including thousands of Hawaiians, Japanese, Filipinos, Pacific Islanders, etc.) — who made up the millions of soldiers who sacrificed their lives in that World War, there would not be an island in the Pacific, especially Hawaii, that would be able to enjoy the freedom of religion and prosperity that all of Hawaii’s many wonderful races enjoy today.
Mahalo to our veterans!
Gerald Wright
Pahoa